Early Head Start programs recruit and train home visitors to provide high-quality services tailored to the unique needs of infants, toddlers, and pregnant women and delivered in families’ homes. This brief presents information about how Early Head Start home-based programs hire qualified and competent home visiting staff and how they support these staff in ongoing professional development.

Why This Matters

There is limited research on how Early Head Start home-based programs make decisions about hiring home visitor staff and how programs support these staff in ongoing professional development.

What We Found

• When hiring home visitors, almost all programs reported reviewing transcripts and resumes, checking references, and asking applicants how they would respond to a hypothetical situation. Almost all programs considered applicants’ education, years of experience, credentials or licenses, compensation of existing home visitors and other data on employee compensation.
• Over 85 percent of programs engaged in individualized professional development, such as reviewing home visit and socialization plans, reviewing child assessment data, and conducting individual and group supervision.
• About one third of programs partnered with local colleges, universities, high schools, technical schools, or Child Development Associates programs to support home visitors build qualifications, while around two thirds partnered with organizations offering training or professional development to help home visitors build competencies.
• Programs more frequently offered certain incentives to support home visitors’ participation in professional development. Over two thirds of programs reported paying for training, professional development, or tuition; supporting enrollment in education programs, providing food or drinks at on-site trainings; and covering costs for trainings outside of work hours. Providing bonuses and salary raises were less common, with just over one third reporting providing these. Almost all programs using incentives reported they were somewhat or very successful in encouraging home visitors to improve qualifications and competencies.

How We Did It

The project team analyzed data from the 2024 Survey of Staff Recruitment, Training, and Professional Development in Early Head Start, a nationally representative sample of 527 programs during the 2023–2024 program year. The survey included questions for programs offering home-based services about how they hired qualified home visiting staff and supported their ongoing development. The final sample included 527 programs, with 30 percent reporting on home visitors. Most respondents were program directors (75 percent), and over half (51 percent) had more than five years of experience.