Infant/Early Childhood Mental Health (IECMH) Consultation

The IECMH Consultation Program in Pennsylvania emerged as a response to a 2006 report from the BUILD Infant-Toddler Task Force, which provided recommendations for improving social-emotional outcomes for the state’s young children.  That same year, IECMH Consultation was piloted in the state. As a result of the program’s early success, the Office of Child Development and Early Learning (OCDEL) funded a statewide implementation of IECMH Consultation to continue to support the early childhood system workforce in supporting the social and emotional development of infants, toddlers and very young children. Over the course of the past 14 years, the program has had continued support and sustainable funding from the state as a result of continuous quality improvement efforts, evaluation (internal and external) strategies, program outcomes that reduce expulsion risk, as well as demonstration of the large demand for these supports by childcare programs across the state. While originally implemented in collaboration with OCDEL’s regional business partners (formally the Regional Keys), beginning in FY 2019-2020 the Pennsylvania Key added the talented consultants to our staff complement.  This strategy has created a single point of referral for the entire state, has improved our ability to consistently triage requests, manage a wait list, monitor equitable distribution of services, and maximize our ability to identify gaps in coverage and reallocate staff assignments.  As a result of this change, we have expanded our staff complement to a total of 29.  Our team is regionally based across the Commonwealth to serve and support childcare programs participating in Keystone STARS, including center, family and group-based care.