The Caplan Foundation for Early Childhood is intended to be an incubator of promising research and development projects that may ultimately enhance the general welfare of young children (from birth to age 7) across the country. Each of its grants is made with the expectation that a successful project outcome will be of significant interest to other investigators or developers, within the grantee's field of endeavor, and will be amenable to beneficial application or adaptation elsewhere. In essence, the Foundation's goal is to provide seed money for those imaginative endeavors, addressed to the needs of young children, which appear most likely to bear fruit on a national scale.