About Us | Our History

Founded by Dr. Donna Housman, Ed.D, the Housman Institute is an early childhood teacher training, research, and advocacy organization that seeks to provide the building blocks of emotional intelligence for lifelong learning and success.

Our begin to ECSEL® program has educated thousands of young children and we have trained hundreds of teachers in our emotional, cognitive, and social early learning approach since the inception of our lab school, The Beginnings School and Child Development Center in Weston, MA in 1985.

With the support of our learning lab, our training facility, and our child development center, our evidence-based program is:

• Informed by a large body of evidence-based research in neuroscience and early childhood development
• Backed by scientific research that shows that children who participate in our program outperform national cohorts in critical foundational skills of emotional competence, self-regulation, empathy, and others
• Steeped in a long history of practical experience in the field of early childhood development and education