Category Archives: RIKInstitute

Displayed in the attached document is a comparison of regulatory compliance metric principles, prevailing paradigms and a continuum of quality matrix. These principles and key elements have been presented in previous posts but here they are presented side by side … Continue reading →

A technical research note/abstract combining research from several regulatory compliance metrics over the past decade into one abstract emphasizing the public policy implications of this research. From the introduction to the abstract “This technical research note/abstract provides a data matrix … Continue reading →

A short paper is posted proposing ten principles to consider when dealing with regulatory compliance measurement within the regulatory science field. It is based upon 50 years of research diving deep into regulatory compliance data at the state, national, and … Continue reading →

Here is a link to the Licensing Measurement and Monitoring Systems eHandBook online for easy access via a digital publishing site.

Here is a new report on monitoring practices used in child care and early education licensing published by OPRE’s TRLECE: The Role of Licensing in Early Care and Education Project. This is a wonderful new resource which will help to … Continue reading →

Here are the eHandBook and the Powerpoint Slide Deck for Licensing Measurement and Monitoring Systems that can be used by licensing administrators, regulatory scientists, licensing researchers, and licensing program staff. These contain the latest research updates. For those interested, please … Continue reading →

Below is the second edition of the Licensing Measurement and Monitoring System eHandBook: Regulatory science applied to human services regulatory administration for regulatory scientists, licensing researchers, regulatory administrators and their policy and program staffs.

The purpose of this blog post is to point out the intersections, differences and similarities of integrative, differential/inferential and coordinated monitoring as used in the monitoring of human service programs. Program monitoring has changed over the years in that not … Continue reading →

Kenya, in particular researchers from Kisii University, is using the theory of regulatory compliance in a very useful way to impact their regulatory environment and to promulgate effective and efficient regulations related to various industries. This study by Dr Wilfred … Continue reading →

Here are two articles from the past that highlight early care and education professional development and accreditation and other program quality initiatives that are still pertinent today, that is why I am sharing them today. Take a look at the … Continue reading →

As we begin a new year and reflect on where early care and education (ECE) is headed, we may need to acknowledge a new normal for the field. I am sure many of my colleagues in ECE will not be … Continue reading →

Creating national standards for any industry based upon empirical evidence is possible in analyzing research over the past 50 years in human services. Research completed in human service regulatory science gives a pretty good blueprint in how this can be … Continue reading →

An interesting article about ways to improve compliance measures and implementation in Ukraine. The purpose of the article is to study relatively new phenomenon of compliance (Theory of Regulatory Compliance, Fiene, 2016, 2019) for Ukraine and to identify its priority … Continue reading →

There is the need to revise the risk assessment methodology that has been used in the differential monitoring approach. In the past risk assessment has always been listed along with the key indicator methodology as the two approaches for differential … Continue reading →

Here is a letter from over 400 Penn State Faculty members concerned about a leadership decision to not follow through with its commitment to creating a Center for Racial Justice. Please see the following letter for the issues and the … Continue reading →

I learned today that I am in the top ten clubs: (top 10% of authors) and top 10,000 downloaded papers (Theory of Regulatory Compliance) on SSRN, the repository for new research in the social sciences. See the two notifications below:

I received this email today: Congratulations on your nomination and initiation into Sigma Xi, The Scientific Research Honor Society! More information about your membership will be sent to your email soon. If you have any questions concerning Sigma Xi, please … Continue reading →

Sometimes we have a tendency to push the envelope too far and the contents of the envelope gets lost in the process. You can tell that there is high inflation because the “money stealer wildflowers” are really bad this year. … Continue reading →

For those of you who are interested in the NARA Licensing Measurement Course I wanted to provide a location map on where you can find all the resources for the course because they have grown a great deal over the … Continue reading →

Here is the link to a poster presentation with Dr Sonya Stevens, Daniel Blevins, and Amber Salzer entitled: Identifying Predictive Indicators: The State of Washington Foster Care Home Study. The poster presentation was at the National Research Conference on Early … Continue reading →

Below is the National Research Conference on Early Childhood Program Book which gives the details of the 2022 conference with all presenters and their sessions. The conference will be held June 27-29, 2022. NRCEC presents the latest research on early … Continue reading →

Below is a Licensing Measurement & Program Monitoring Systems eHandBook to accompany the NARA Licensing Measurement and Systems course. It is recommended to be read along with taking the NARA course but it can be read as a stand alone … Continue reading →

The attached report is as relevant today as it was 25 years ago; it is a synthesis of major issues, policy questions, available research findings and information needs in child care policy, presented in a form that can provide a … Continue reading →

This is an older report but I thought it was still relevant today, so I wanted to post it for other ECE researchers and regulatory scientists to review and use. The Better Care for the Babies (BCTB) Project was initiated … Continue reading →

Below is a policy commentary article just published in the Journal of Regulatory Science, Volume 10, Issue 1 on regulatory science monitoring paradigms and the relationship between regulatory compliance and program quality. Eighteen key elements are introduced in a series … Continue reading →

Below is a brief technical research note providing an example of a data analysis plan utilizing risk assessment indicators. It provides a means for thinking about how best to implement such a plan from initial design to validation of the … Continue reading →

Here are five studies that demonstrate validation of the Licensing Key Indicator (LKI), Risk Assessment Methodology (RAM), and Regulatory Compliance Theory (RCT). The studies were done in the states of Georgia (RAM, RCT), Washington (RAM, RCT) national with Head Start … Continue reading →

Here is a recently published article on comparing online mandated reporter trainings which highlights the iLookOut Child Abuse Prevention Training program. Very interesting state by state comparisons.

The 2 x 2 matrix format has been used in many different contexts when it comes to decision making. I have found the 2 x 2 matrix very useful in regulatory science especially when it comes to measuring regulatory compliance … Continue reading →

Two of the most widely used early care and education program quality tools used in the field are the CLASS: Classroom Assessment Scoring System and ERS: Environmental Rating Scales. Is there an advantage to using one versus the other. In … Continue reading →

I get asked all the time about what is the difference between the Key Indicator and the Risk Assessment methodologies. Generally I reply with a very academic type of response either explaining the difference given the research literature or the … Continue reading →

I have discussed licensing measurement a great deal in this blog. Today, I want to introduce a new term to basically describe what I have been discussing with licensing measurement, called Regulatory Metrics or RegalMetrics for short. The reason for … Continue reading →

Below are a series of resources for the licensing measurement/regulatory science course that are organized as anthologies and summarizing information from the RIKI Publications webpage. 1. Class Syllabus: Lists the 13 classes with a brief summary of what is to … Continue reading →

Attached please find an anthology that contains technical research notes from the past decade on regulatory science, differential monitoring and licensing measurement. I thought it would be helpful to regulatory scientists and licensing researchers to have all these various research … Continue reading →

Here is a policy commentary manuscript that delineates the key elements or alternate program quality paradigms and their subsequent implications for regulatory compliance measurement and program quality that has been submitted to the Journal of Regulatory Science. This manuscript is … Continue reading →

This article was published in 2002 in Child and Youth Care Forum. This article built off several studies in Pennsylvania which clearly demonstrated the lack of an effective professional development system, especially involving infant toddler caregivers. The mentoring/coaching intervention as … Continue reading →

This article was published in 1980 in NARA News as a licensing measurement enhancement. It really grew out of the regulatory compliance need being addressed at the national level with the changes being made in the Federal Interagency Day Care … Continue reading →

This article appeared in the Child Care Information Exchange in the mid 1990s. In the early part of that decade, Gwen Morgan, one of the pioneers of early care and education (ECE) regulatory science and administration, proposed the child care … Continue reading →

This article published in the International Journal of Child Care and Educational Policy in 2013 compared the regulatory compliance within the USA with approximately 20 other countries to determine the emphasis placed upon rules and regulations in the respective countries. … Continue reading →

This article published in the Journal of Regulatory Science in 2019 has helped to create an interesting heuristic problematic for the regulatory science field. The essence of the treatise is moving regulatory policy from full compliance with all rules to … Continue reading →

This is an article written back in 1985 that really tied licensing measurement together into a quantitative approach of instrument based program monitoring rather than case anecdotal records and proposed the use of key indicators/predictor rules, risk assessment/weighting of rules, … Continue reading →

Attached are several examples of Federal, national, and state reports on state of the art licensing and differential monitoring initiatives. These reports have helped to shape the research efforts as we move forward with licensing and differential monitoring in early … Continue reading →

This blog post will attempt to place the Regulatory Compliance Theory of Diminishing Returns into everyday terms addressing its potential implications beyond the human services and suggest how it can be applied anywhere in which standards/regulations/rules are utilized in the … Continue reading →

The history of licensing measurement and regulatory compliance has actually a rather long lineage but is still in its infancy in terms of development. In the early stages most licensing visits and inspection results were recorded via anecdotal records/case records … Continue reading →

A technical research note is provided for other licensing researchers and statisticians who are interested in replicating the methodology through the use of a alternate statistical software package, such as SPSS, Systat or SAS. The research note provides all the … Continue reading →

This technical research note will integrate the Key Indicator Matrix (KIM) and the Risk Assessment Matrix (RAM) into one platform to clearly demonstrate their statistical modeling overlap.  Key Indicators deal with the ability to predict overall compliance or performance based … Continue reading →

Here are two documents, one, a technical research note on the latest version of the Early Childhood Program Quality Improvement/Indicator Model (V5)(ECPQIM5a) and two, a powerpoint slide presentation on Licensing Measurement (PPT189).

Attached to this post is a new land use study completed in Kenya utilizing the Theory of Regulatory Compliance. It was published in the International Journal of Human Capital in Urban Management: Planning implication of universities growth on land use: … Continue reading →

I have been reading about the Tennessee Study regarding their Pre-K program and their lack of success. Unfortunately, the goals of the program to help very disadvantaged children gain and sustain those gains overtime did not come to fruition according … Continue reading →

In a previous RIKINote (4-8-2018), linear and non-linear models were discussed on a very broad scale. In this note, the Theory of Regulatory Compliance is being suggested as a non-linear paradigm to the dominant neoclassical economic theory and the linear … Continue reading →

This blog post will propose a new Regulatory Compliance Scale (RCS)(Fiene, 2022) which should help in making comparisons between regulatory compliance and program quality systems, such as Environmental Rating Scales and Quality Rating & Improvement systems. The proposed scale builds … Continue reading →

The major publications surrounding Caring for Our Children dealing with risk assessment and key indicators along with their respective checklists/tools. Each of the publications are listed here for your convenience.

Here is the July 2019 National Resource Center for Health and Safety in Child Care and Early Education Guide for parents in choosing safe and healthy child care. It is a really nice checklist that should help parents in comparing … Continue reading →

It all started in and around 1965 when the Federal government got into early care and education (ECE) in earnest with Head Start and federally funded day care for low-income families.  It started off slowly but began to pick up … Continue reading →

Two technical research notes dealing with a paradigm shift related to program monitoring and its subsequent impact on regulatory compliance and quality. These research notes help to develop the key elements, principles, and dimensions when thinking about designing and implementing … Continue reading →

Attached below are two reports from Saskatchewan and Florida which delineate their respective experiences with developing differential monitoring systems.

Below is a series of technical research notes dealing with licensing measurement paradigm considerations involving performance assessments, regulatory compliance modeling, risk assessment and weighting. It provides some of the latest thinking related to regulatory compliance and performance assessments as a … Continue reading →

Here are two papers dealing with the licensing key indicator predictor methodology, regulatory compliance and licensing management that help to round out some of the latest research in regulatory science utilizing an international database from the Early Childhood Program Quality … Continue reading →

Starting this Fall 2021, NARA – National Association for Regulatory Administration in conjunction with the Research Institute for Key Indicators (RIKI) will be offering a new course, Licensing Measurement and Systems. The course is being developed by Dr Richard Fiene, … Continue reading →

This past January 2021, the National Association for Regulatory Administration (NARA) and the Research Institute for Key Indicators (RIKI) renewed their exclusive licensing key indicator agreement for 5 additional years. The new agreement has several interesting enhancements. Probably the most … Continue reading →

Here is the series of regulatory compliance and performance papers organized into an anthology for easy reading. I included the original paper as reference but after that paper all the other papers support and add to this original paper. Also, … Continue reading →