For Our Babies: Ending the Invisible Neglect of America's Infants

For the last 40 years, J. Ronald Lally has worked with state and federal agencies to improve services for infants and toddlers in the United States and abroad. In this new book, Lally paints a stark picture of how our babies have been forced to shoulder the fallout of massive societal changes over the past 60 years―changes that have resulted in less access to their parents, longer time spent in child care, and substandard child care and services.

For Our Babies features the resonant voices of American parents speaking of their hopes, worries, and frustrations living in a country with too few parental and child supports. It describes American parents’ general lack of awareness about how little they receive from their state and federal governments compared to parents living in other countries. This important book includes crucial testimony from developmental psychologists, child care providers, health and mental health professionals, economists, specialists in brain development, and early learning educators about how policy and practices must change in the United States if parents are to raise children who will become healthy, productive members of society.

This book is part of the For Our Babies initiative. Visit the website, which includes an author blog, at www.forourbabies.org.

J. Ronald Lally is the co-director of the Center for Child and Family Studies at WestEd, an educational research and development laboratory in San Francisco. He created the Program for Infant and Toddler Care and is one of the founders of ZERO TO THREE: National Center for Infants, Toddlers, and Families.