Literature on Early Care and Education Apprenticeships: An Annotated Bibliography

1. What is known about the development of apprenticeship programs and associated facilitators and challenges?
2. What is known about the implementation of apprenticeship programs and associated facilitators and challenges?
3. What is known about participation (at the state system, provider, and/or individual level) in apprenticeship programs?
4. What is known about the financing of apprenticeship programs?
5. What is known about the effectiveness of apprenticeship programs, and what are the documented outcomes?
6. What are the outcomes of interest to the field?
7. What data sources are available to address questions about outcomes, implementation, participation, and financing of apprenticeship programs?

This annotated bibliography documents the knowledge base on early care and education (ECE) apprenticeships. This report may be helpful to ECE apprenticeship program developers, ECE apprenticeship industry intermediaries and other technical assistance providers, institutes of higher education that implement ECE apprenticeship programs, researchers, and local, state, and federal policymakers.

The research team identified 44 publications that are relevant to ECE apprenticeships—16 of which the team categorized as research publications. Of these 16 research publications, 12 are summaries of descriptive research studies including implementation, process, and case studies, 3 present findings from literature reviews and discussions with experts, and 1 reviews and synthesizes available data on the ECE workforce. The remaining 28 materials and resources include policy briefs and reports, program descriptions, and technical assistance resources and toolkits.

The annotated bibliography includes a summary of each publication, highlighting the following aspects of ECE apprenticeships: development and implementation, participation and access, financing, outcomes and effectiveness, and data sources. For the research studies, the document also summarizes the methodology and research findings.

To identify the resources documented in this annotated bibliography, the research team conducted an environmental scan of research and gray literature, issued a public call for materials and resources on ECE apprenticeships in collaboration with OPRE, and screened and, if relevant, reviewed publications recommended by ECE apprenticeship experts or members of the project team.

Publications were included in the annotated bibliography if they met at least one of the following criteria:

• addressed what is known about ECE apprenticeships
• identified gaps in the knowledge base about ECE apprenticeships
• addressed at least one construct of interest (development and implementation, program components, participation and access, partnerships, training or technical assistance, financing, policy context, data sources)

DelGrosso, Tricia, Erin Doyle, Catherine Kuhns, Diane Schilder, and Helena Wippick (2025), Early Care and Education Apprenticeships Learning Agenda, OPRE Report #2025-071, Washington, DC: Office of Planning, Research, and Evaluation, Administration for Children and Families, US Department of Health and Human Services.

DelGrosso, Tricia, Erin Doyle, Catherine Kuhns, Diane Schilder, and Mariama Badjie (2025). Literature on Early Care and Education Apprenticeships: An Annotated Bibliography, OPRE Report #2025-071, Washington, DC: Office of Planning, Research and Evaluation, Administration for Children and Families, US Department of Health and Human Services.