A grassroots and collaborative approach has emerged in several Pennsylvania communities to provide a cross-sector Rapid Response Team (RRT) deployed to early childhood education (ECE) programs when an early care and education program is struggling with the challenging behavior of a child who is at immediate risk of expulsion. The development of this collaborative service at the local level has been in response to the increase in challenging behaviors in ECE settings combined with historically long waiting lists for the statewide Infant Early Childhood Mental Health Consultation (IECMHC) program.

Locally developed RRTs typically include, but are not limited to, behavioral health professionals, Early Intervention (EI) professionals and Early Learning Resource Center (ELRC) staff. Often a product of braided local funding or in-kind donation of staff time/effort, this local approach has helped to facilitate and support partnerships across the mixed delivery system and strengthen cross-sector referral networks.

In general, the role of RRT’s is to:

NOTE: Rapid Response Teams are not to be confused with county Crisis Intervention Services. 

In response to increasing interest from ECE stakeholders, Pennsylvania’s Office of Child Development and Early Learning (OCDEL) supported the development of a Rapid Response Team (RTT) Toolkit and Training Approach to provide a framework for additional Pennsylvania communities to explore collaborative capacity to implement a similar approach within existing early learning and cross-sector partnerships and funding streams.

To expand RRTs across the state and help standardize the development of RRTs, OCDEL, through the renewed federal Preschool Development Grant (PDG), will award nineteen (19) Rapid Response Mini Grants to local collaboratives to create teams, support emerging teams, or enhance existing Rapid Response approaches. PDG will fund training, development, and implementation of RRT model approaches and include a cross-site evaluation. Increasing access to RRTs locally will support the following goals: 

PDG grantees will be required to collect including, but not limited to number of applications program demographics, contact hours, referral, and case outcome.  These data points will be incorporated into data for a cross-site evaluation and can be used at the local level for continuous quality improvement. A grantee specific annual summary of activities and trends will be submitted across the life of the grant.  

Funded partnerships will be local and/or regional and must include a connection to the regional OCDEL Early Learning Resource Center, however the ELRC is not required to be the primary organization applying for the grant.  Only one mini grant per ELRC region will be awarded, therefore it is recommended that the grant application be collaborative and include a variety of system partners to support implementation and sustainability efforts. 

The focus of this funding opportunity is to support development and/or expansion of early childhood focused Rapid Response Team approaches to meet Pennsylvania’s early childhood workforce needs by supporting programs struggling with the challenging behavior of a child(ren), providing short term support to the program’s staff, child, and child’s family, and utilizing community and regional partnerships to provide warm handoffs to additional community supports as necessary.  An approved grantee must design and implement an approach that:

In November 2023, the Pennsylvania Key, on behalf of the Pennsylvania Office of Child Development and Early Learning (OCDEL), awarded 18 Rapid Response Team mini-grants for $200,000 to begin a 6-month Planning with six months Implementation or a 1-year implementation grant starting January 2024. The work will support a grassroots and collaborative approach which emerged in several Pennsylvania communities to provide a cross-sector Rapid Response Team (RRT) deployed to early childhood education (ECE) programs when an ECE program is struggling with the challenging behavior of a child who is at immediate risk of expulsion.