Quality First: Arizona’s Early Learning Quality Improvement and Rating System Implementation and Validation Study

Quality First is Arizona’s voluntary Quality Improvement and Rating System, a signature strategy of First Things First. We conducted an evaluation to provide a review and analysis of Quality First to inform implementation and continuous improvement of the initiative. Specifically, there were three main goals to the study:

Goal 1: Conduct a review of Quality First’s conceptual framework and program design.

Goal 2: Assess the Quality First data system.

Goal 3: Conduct a validation of the Quality First Rating Scale to examine if the ratings are fair, accurate and meaningful.