Yoonjeon is a Lead Research Analyst at the Center for the Study of Child Care Employment, where she focuses on the early care and education workforce in California and the long-standing injustices that permeate the system. She draws from over a decade of research experience studying the ways in which macro-social factors and systemic inequities shape educational policies and practices. In recognition of her scholarship, she received the American Educational Research Association (AERA) and Society for Research on Child Development (SRCD) Early Career Fellowship (2017-2018) and won the 2019 Richard Wolf Best Article Award from the International Association for the Evaluation of Educational Achievement. Dr. Kim earned her Ph.D. in Education from the University of California, Berkeley. In her free time, she enjoys hiking Bay Area trails and trying out Korean fusion recipes.
Publications by Yoonjeon Kim
February 8, 2023 • Brief • By Anna Powell, Elena Montoya, Lea J.E. Austin, Yoonjeon Kim, Wanzi Muruvi and Abby Copeman Petig
Drawing on findings from the 2020 California Early Care and Education Workforce Study, this brief provides statewide data on teachers of preschool-age children. This brief explores the experiences of early…
Teaching Transitional Kindergarten: A Snapshot of the Teacher Experience Before UTK Expansion
December 6, 2022 • Report • By Elena Montoya, Anna Powell, Lea J.E. Austin, Yoonjeon Kim, Wanzi Muruvi and Abby Copeman Petig
In the fall of 2020, CSCCE surveyed almost 300 TK teachers in classrooms throughout California as part of the California Early Care and Education Workforce Study. This brief provides…
August 23, 2022 • Report • By Elena Montoya, Lea J.E. Austin, Anna Powell, Yoonjeon Kim, Abby Copeman Petig and Wanzi Muruvi
Drawing on findings from the 2020 California Early Care and Education Workforce Study, this report provides statewide and regional wage and benefits data for home- and center- based early…
Early Care and Education Programs During COVID-19: Persistent Inequities and Emerging Challenges
June 1, 2022 • Report • By Yoonjeon Kim, Elena Montoya, Lea J.E. Austin, Anna Powell and Wanzi Muruvi
This report takes a closer look at the impact of COVID-19 on early care and education (ECE) programs, staffing and disparities using data collected by the Center by the Center…
Double or Nothing? Potential TK Wages for California’s Early Educators
June 1, 2022 • Data Snapshot • By Anna Powell, Elena Montoya, Lea J.E. Austin and Yoonjeon Kim
California has proposed a broad expansion of transitional kindergarten (TK), a school-based early learning program serving four-year-olds. This improvement will make TK universally available to all four-year-olds by 2025, framed…
May 5, 2022 • Peer-Reviewed Article • By Yoonjeon Kim, Elena Montoya, Sean Doocy, Lea J.E. Austin and Marcy Whitebook
In this article, published in the 3rd Quarter 2022 volume of Early Childhood Research Quarterly, Dr. Kim, Ms. Montoya, and co-authors highlight how the impacts of COVID-19 systematically varied between…