Hillary Clinton Discusses Children's Early Learning at AAP Conference

SAN DIEGO — Former Secretary of State, senator, and First Lady Hillary Rodham Clinton thanked pediatricians for what they do for children, their parents—and sometimes even their grandparents—for the health of children in America in her address to pediatricians gathered here at the American Academy of Pediatrics National Conference and Exhibition.

In the special plenary session, Clinton announced the launch of the AAP's updated early literacy toolkit for pediatricians and parents, Books Build Connections. While at one point deftly and coolly shaking off a heckler's noisy interruption, Clinton also described the Too Small to Fail program, a joint initiative of the Bill, Hillary & Chelsea Clinton Foundation and Next Generation, a nonpartisan group that promotes scientific research about early childhood development.

"Economic pressures on parents translate into less time reading and talking, and singing," Clinton said. Addressing socioeconomic disparities in literacy and learning among children, she spoke of the "word gap": "By age 3, children from low-income families have learned, on average, half as many words as children from middle- and upper-income families. By the time they enter school, they have substantially smaller vocabularies than many of their classmates," she said. 

"This word gap leads directly to an achievement gap, with lifelong consequences."

Too Small to Fail aims to help parents and businesses take meaningful actions to improve the health and well-being of U.S. children 5 years of age and younger, and to promote new research on the science of children’s brain development, early learning, literacy, and early health. Among its goals are to help parents, businesses, and communities identify specific actions, consistent with the new research, that they can take to improve the lives of young children. 

As part of a partnership between the AAP and Too Small to Fail, Scholastic Inc. agreed to donate 500,000 children's books to be distributed to kids via 20,000 health care providers through the Reach Out and Read program.

"Our country's future depends on healthy kids and loving families. They're the building blocks of a strong and prosperous society," Clinton has said of the initiative in a video describing it.

As First Lady, Hillary Clinton advocated for health care reform and led successful bipartisan efforts to improve the adoption and foster care systems, reduce teen pregnancy, establish Early Head Start and provide health care to millions of children through the Children's Health Insurance Program.

The Too Small to Fail program represents Hillary Clinton's first major project as a private citizen. Still, Clinton remains in the public eye amid speculation about whether she will again run for president in 2016 as she did in 2008.

Also speaking at the special session—and reciting the classic children's book, Goodnight Moon, was Pamela High, MD, lead author of the AAP's early literacy statement. "Pediatricians want all parents and caregivers to know that by making special one-on-one time every day to read, they are promoting their child's early learning," High said. This kind of treasured experience actually creates new connections in their child's brain that promote language and development as well as reinforce the parent-child bond, she added.

In a related pediatrics note, Hillary Clinton recently became a first-time grandparent: Charlotte Clinton Mezvinsky was born to Chelsea Clinton and her husband, Marc Mezvinsky, on Sept. 26. 

—Michael Gerchufsky