As a sequel to the report on the development of psychoanalytic child mental health centers in Los Angeles, which appeared in the April, 1968 issue of the Newsletter, we have received an item about a similar center in Chicago. The ensuing report on CIECE was submitted by Dr. Gerhart Piers, Director of the Chicago Institute for Psychoanalysis.
The Chicago Institute for Early Childhood Education opened its doors in September 1966. It was set up on two premises: one, that there is a tremendous nationwide shortage of trained teachers of preschool children in urban and rural slums and two, that psychoanalytic psychology could provide the logical basis for the training of preschool teachers.
Today, only twenty months old, CIECE plays a significant role in “Headstart.” Its graduates move directly into key positions, notably as Headstart supervisors and consultants; its faculty is used by the Office of Economic Opportunity (O.E.O.) in Washington for “first
aid” to ailing Head Start Training Programs all over the nation; a series of radio tapes entitled “Psychoanalytic Contributions to the Problems of Slum Children” produced by CIECE faculty was heard over stations in New York, Boston, Los Angeles and Detroit, and is now being used by a number of teacher colleges and departments of child development, psychology, and by medical schools. Recently CIECE became affiliated with Loyola University in Chicago as an independent institute offering a Master's Degree, the first one of its kind.
The CIECE curriculum comprises interdisciplinary courses in psychoanalytic development, cognitive development, cultural anthropology, theory of play, physical growth, community organization, and includes supervised practice teaching. The courses are highly integrated with each other and with the practice and are tailor-made for those who teach the “oedipal” child. The Center for Early Education in Los Angeles (Newsletter, April, 1968), along with Bank Street College and Sarah Lawrence College were most helpful to CIECE in its initial stages.
CIECE, under the leadership of Barbara T. Bowman, Maria W. Piers and Lorraine Wallach is spon sored by the Chicago Institute for Psychoanalysis and has several psychoanalysts serving on its Board, the faculty, and the Advisory Board. Among its guest lecturers have been Anna Freud, James E. Anthony, Rudolf Ekstein, Evelyn Omwake, Robert Coles, Charlotte Winsor, and Eleanor Pavenstedt.