NAEYC’ s Centennial Year: 100 Years of Impact
Bernard“ Bud” Spodek and Lilian G. Katz
From Humble Beginnings to Extraordinary Impacts
Mary E. Lyons, Tanya Espinosa Cordoba, Stephanie C. Sanders-Smith, and Michaelene M. Ostrosky
As NAEYC celebrates 100 years of promoting high-quality early learning, we acknowledge that its mission has been shaped by many notable figures in the field. Two such individuals, Drs. Bernard“ Bud” Spodek and Lilian G. Katz, both served as president of NAEYC’ s Governing Board while also shaping the field of early childhood education at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign and beyond. These leaders made significant contributions toward expanding how the field understands and responds to children through an asset-based lens:
› Dr. Spodek advocated for the incorporation of special education content in early childhood teacher education programs. This was to ensure that future educators were prepared to provide inclusive settings for all children.
› Dr. Katz advocated for children to learn through inquiry- and project-based work. This included children from low socioeconomic backgrounds enrolled in Head Start programs.
Their work resonates today. Early childhood educators face challenges in creating learning goals, environments, and experiences that honor children’ s cultures, languages, and abilities( NASEM 2024). Educators must guard against individual biases and structural inequities by using strengths-based teaching approaches that recognize the importance of children’ s multifaceted identities and assets( NAEYC 2019). These are vital to the richness of early childhood education and require strong leadership and advocacy on behalf of children and the professionals who care for and educate them( NAEYC 2019, 2020).
Bidirectional relationships between early childhood educators and organizations are key to this work. Practitioners need and benefit from robust professional organizations like NAEYC that represent their interests. Likewise, these organizations need a strong membership base and individuals who are willing to speak up for the collective. These reciprocal relationships transform and shape the work that early childhood educators do with children and their families and how that work is seen in society.
As individuals who worked with or were taught by Drs. Spodek and Katz at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, we had front row seats to observe their impact on early childhood education. In this article, we present biographical sketches of each, then highlight how their work resonates within the field today.
Spring 2026 Young Children 47