Activating systems of care for whole child development in fragile contexts: A case study from Haiti using the qualitative impact protocol

Early childhood is a critical period for shaping long-term developmental outcomes, yet in fragile contexts like Haiti, state systems often lack the capacity to deliver comprehensive early childhood development (ECD) services. This study examines the Leveraging the Home, School, and Church (L3) initiative in Northern Haiti, a whole child development (WCD) intervention implemented with the Catholic Church. Using the Qualitative Impact Protocol (QuIP), we explored how the L3 intervention influenced caregiver, teacher, and church leader behaviors across the interconnected domains of home (lakay), school (lekòl), and church (legliz), as well as which specific components of the intervention participants attributed those changes to. Findings reveal significant self-reported changes in parenting and teaching practices, particularly in the areas of positive discipline, home learning, and social-emotional learning, with participants consistently attributing these shifts to their involvement in L3 training. While the church served as a vital platform for convening and lent symbolic legitimacy to WCD messaging, its role in directly driving behavior change was limited. These results highlight the potential of integrated, systems-based approaches to support child development in low-resource settings and point to the need for further research on optimizing the role of faith-based institutions in ECD programing.