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Silvia Moron: a Strategies for Children Intern

Posted in International, K-12, MA Legislature, Massachusetts Cities and Towns, Philanthropy, Strategies for Children, tagged #ece, #Interns, #mapoli, #StrategiesforChildren on May 25, 2023| Leave a Comment »

Silvia Moron and State Senator Jason Lewis

Silvia Moron grew up in Haiti, and when she arrived in the United States in 2009, she wanted to be a diplomat.

“My dream was to work for the United Nations and be an ambassador,” Moron says.

To start her career, however, she decided to become a nurse. She loves helping people, and this career would, she decided, give her the stability she needed to pursue her dreams.

Today, Moron is an intern at Strategies for Children. She’s studying political science at Bunker Hill Community College, and she plans to transfer to a four-year college to study foreign relations.

Moron also runs the Sephora Moron Foundation, which she launched in 2020 to raise money for poor children who don’t have access to education. Put all this work together, and it adds up to Moron’s vision of helping the world by becoming an ambassador who represents poor people, advocates for excellent health care, and promotes education.

What drew Moron to Strategies was the chance to learn about advocacy and policy.

Back in January, on the first day of her internship, Moron joined Strategies’ staff at the Massachusetts State House for the release of the Early Childhood Agenda.

“It was super-exciting. It was my first time at the State House, and I got to pose with Senator Lewis, and he posted the picture on Facebook,” Moron says of State Senator Jason Lewis (D-5^th Middlesex). “And I talked to him about Strategies.”

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Lessons from Somerville: How to build a strong and sustainable early childhood system

Posted in Cost and affordability, COVID-19, Family engagement, Funding, MA state budget, Massachusetts Cities and Towns, Philanthropy, Pre-kindergarten, tagged #earlyed, #ece, #InvestInChildCare, #MARunsOnChildCare on February 23, 2023| Leave a Comment »

Photo: Huong Vu for Strategies for Children

Somerville, Mass., has spent years building a strong foundation for its early education and care programs.

Now, a case study – One Somerville, Every Child — explores how Somerville has used a three-year (2019-2022), $1 million grant from the Commonwealth Children’s Fund to make vital progress that will support young children and families – and set an example other cities can learn from.

This work began in 2018 when representatives of the City of Somerville and the Somerville Public Schools were introduced to team members from the Commonwealth Children’s Fund – thanks to the Harvard Education Redesign Lab’s By All Means Initiative.”

Somerville officials “shared plans and dreams they had for expanding their early childhood services, and the CCF team shared their plans to start investing in communities piloting innovations in early childhood systems,” the case study says.

Somerville had three goals it sought to achieve:

• expand and institutionalize its early childhood programs

• expand its existing preschool initiatives, and

• bridge the gaps between children’s birth and when they start school

Another program that was central in the grant-funded work was “Somerville’s light-touch, universal home visiting program, SomerBaby,” a first point of connection “to early childhood services and supports for many families.”

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“Early Childhood 101” – a new resource for Massachusetts

Posted in Child care, Family engagement, Head Start, Health, Infants and toddlers, Massachusetts Cities and Towns, Philanthropy, Pre-kindergarten, Research, Social-emotional development, tagged #earlychildhood, #EC101 on February 2, 2023| Leave a Comment »

“A child is born in Massachusetts… then what happens?”

That’s the important question that the new website EC 101 tries to answer for parents, providers, policymakers, and philanthropists who want to promote healthy childhood development across Massachusetts by mapping out the state’s many early childhood programs and resources.

Ideally, Brian Gold says, the answer to What happens after a child is born? should be that children “grow and thrive.” Gold is the executive director of the Massachusetts Early Childhood Funder Collaborative, a group of individuals and foundations that worked with the Rennie Center for Education Research & Policy to create EC 101 (short for Early Childhood 101).

But Gold — as a professional, a former foster parent, and the father of a 15-month-old child — sees a clear need for more clarity.

To create this clarity, EC 101’s goal is to tame the state’s complex early childhood system by creating “a visual, accessible format that allows for clear understanding of the current conditions of the early childhood landscape.”

To do this, the website draws on feedback from parents, stakeholders, and experts as well as on state and national research to create an interactive tool that’s full of information. The website can also be translated into multiple languages, everything from Albanian and Chinese to Thai and Yiddish.

An EC 101 webinar is posted above.

One important distinction that EC 101 makes is that there are early childhood systems – and there’s a “non-system.”

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Happy anniversary, Amy!

Posted in Business and economy, Child care, COVID-19, Dept. of Early Education and Care, Early educators, Higher Education, Massachusetts Cities and Towns, Philanthropy, Pre-kindergarten, Professional development & preparation, Strategies for Children, tagged #EarlyEducators, #ece, #RedSox on June 29, 2022| 5 Comments »

Amy O’Leary at the Massachusetts State House in 2011

We’re thrilled to wish Amy O’Leary a happy 20^th anniversary! She started working at Strategies for Children on June 24, 2002.

We sat down with O’Leary to talk about this milestone.

“I have to say how grateful I am to have been at Strategies for Children for the last 20 years,” O’Leary says. “I would have never imagined that I would have this kind of job.”

O’Leary’s work with young children started at Skidmore College where she earned a degree in psychology and early education.

“I didn’t do a traditional K-12 education major,” O’Leary recalls, “because I was very interested in understanding why children did what they did, and how they sat in the context of family and community.”

O’Leary’s campus job as a financial aid student was working as a classroom assistant at the Skidmore Early Childhood Center, a laboratory school affiliated with Skidmore’s Education Department, where she also did her student-teaching.

“It was such an important part of my college experience to have that world where I could go three times a week, whether it was to my campus job or [for] student teaching, and develop relationships with families.”

“I don’t think I realized how wonderful the program was, and how it prepared me for my next job as a preschool teacher in Boston.”

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An early education “Epiphany”

Posted in Boston, COVID-19, Diversity equity and inclusion, Early educators, Family engagement, Health, Philanthropy, Pre-kindergarten, Social-emotional development, tagged #earlyed, #ece, #Epiphany, #NeverGiveUpOnAChild on April 28, 2022| Leave a Comment »

Photo: Pavel Danilyuk from Pexels

What happens when a foster parent learns about an early learning center that’s willing to try a new approach?

Progress.

That’s the story Kate Audette tells about a child placed in her care by the Massachusetts Department of Children and Families (DCF), the state’s child welfare agency.

It was 2020, in the middle of the pandemic and after George Floyd was murdered, when Audette, who has been a licensed foster care provider since 2017, accepted the placement of an infant whom we’ll call Jordan to protect the child’s privacy.

Audette was working from home at the time and planned to keep the baby home “until it felt safe for them to go to school.”

But she did take the baby to a neighborhood rally in support of George Floyd. The event was organized by Dorchester People for Peace. It was outside. Everyone wore masks. It felt safe.

It also turned out to be life changing.

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How the United Way’s fast philanthropy helped early childhood programs face the Omicron surge

Posted in Child care, COVID-19, Funding, Massachusetts Cities and Towns, Philanthropy, Pre-kindergarten, tagged #earlyed, #ece, #philanthropy on March 17, 2022| Leave a Comment »

Photo: RODNAE Productions from Pexels

During the surge of Omicron infections, early education and care providers were once again feeling the crushing weight of the pandemic. Children were getting sick, and so were providers. Staffing shortages were chronic.

Stories of these struggles reached the United Way of Massachusetts Bay and Merrimack Valley, where the staff came up with a plan that could be called rapid-response philanthropy.

“We talked about what we could do to support educators and staff at our partner agencies and the local child care industry in general,” Xavier Andrews, the United Way’s communications director, says. “We came up with the ideas of soliciting corporate support.”

“In January,” a press release adds, “United Way launched the Childcare Appreciation Fund to show appreciation for staff at area childcare centers.”

“To boost morale and cultivate needed equipment, United Way issued a call to action to corporate partners to ‘adopt’ a childcare center either with a financial gift or a gift of testing and protective supplies.”

The responses:

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Share your testimony with the Early Education and Care Economic Review Commission

Posted in Business and economy, Child care, Cost and affordability, COVID-19, Early educators, Funding, MA Legislature, MA state budget, Massachusetts Cities and Towns, Philanthropy, Pre-kindergarten, tagged #mapoli, #SolveChildCare on October 26, 2021| Leave a Comment »

Yesterday, a dozen early educators and leaders submitted testimony at a State House hearing of the Special Legislative Early Education and Care Economic Review Commission.

And there’s still time to email more testimony to the commission. To have the most impact submit your testimony by this Thursday.

The commission, as Senator Jason Lewis (D-Winchester), a commission co-chair, explains on his website, “is tasked with investigating accessibility, affordability, and other concerns surrounding early education and childcare in the Commonwealth, and making recommendations to the state legislature for policy and funding solutions.”

Lewis adds:

“With a growing consensus among the public, the business community and policymakers that high-quality, affordable, accessible early education and childcare are indispensable, this commission has a unique opportunity to lay out a roadmap for bold, transformative policy action.”

Lewis is co-chairing the commission with Representative Alice Peisch (D-Wellesley).

Among those who submitted testimony to the committee is Jessica Seney, vice president of the board at Charlestown Nursery School in Boston, who said in part: (more…)

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A donation from The Eastern Bank Charitable Foundation cushions early childhood programs against COVID-19

Posted in Business and economy, Child care, COVID-19, Philanthropy on May 21, 2020| 1 Comment »

Source: Eastern Bank Instagram page

In the midst of the COVID-19 crisis, early education and care programs are getting crucial philanthropic support.

This includes $5 million in grant funding from Eastern Bank Charitable Foundation, the philanthropic arm of Eastern Bank.

The grants will help “organizations focused on the most vulnerable populations,” including families with young children, emergency child care centers, family child care centers, and child care professionals.

“It takes a community of public and private partners working together to stave off the devastating and long-lasting impacts of this disease, and this philanthropic investment is intended to make a meaningful contribution to this effort,” Bob Rivers, the chair and CEO of Eastern Bank says in a press release.

Nancy Huntington Stager, president and CEO of Eastern Bank Charitable Foundation, adds in the release, “Evidence of the impact of this virus outbreak on our neighbors, families, and small businesses is everywhere. And we also see the resiliency, sheer will, and hope of people across our region as they band together to help one another. The need for assistance continues to grow, and we will continue to do whatever we can to give back as well as encourage those who are able to do so to join us.” (more…)

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How philanthropy can help early childhood programs

Posted in COVID-19, Demographics, Massachusetts Cities and Towns, National, Philanthropy on April 28, 2020| 1 Comment »

Photo: Alessandra Hartkopf for Strategies for Children

Local philanthropy “has an essential role to play.”

That’s the conclusion of an article about early education and care and the coronavirus pandemic.

“My biggest fear now,’ Janet Dotolo, of Melrose Day Care Center and Preschool in Melrose, Mass., says in the article, “is that I won’t be able to reopen when it is safe to do so, because my staff won’t come back.”

The article, which was published by the Bridgespan Group — a nonprofit organization that helps organizations and philanthropists “achieve breakthrough results” — explains:

“The United States has about 129,000 child care centers (a mix of nonprofit, for-profit, and faith-based) and 115,000 licensed home-based providers, who fill a critical need for families not well-served by centers.”

Having a functioning child care system is “of course, a vital resource for the healthy development of the 15 million children under age 6 with working parents.”

But the pandemic has created economic hardships that could force many programs to close permanently, which threatens communities’ abilities “to educate young children and restart their economies.” (more…)

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Bloomberg Philanthropies helps five cities build their own versions of the early childhood language program “Providence Talks”

Posted in Family engagement, Funding, Literacy, National, Philanthropy on October 8, 2019| Leave a Comment »

Children in five cities are going to be exposed to a lot more words.

That’s because Bloomberg Philanthropies has awarded these cities — Birmingham, Ala., Detroit, Mich., Hartford, Conn., Louisville, Ky., and Virginia Beach, Va. — a combined $12 million over three years to replicate Providence Talks.

Providence Talks – “the first-ever Grand Prize Winner of the Bloomberg Philanthropies Mayors Challenge,” according to a Bloomberg press release – is a language-rich early education initiative that equips children with recording devices that track the words children hear and use each day.

The initiative has had “promising results, helping thousands of young children increase their language development. Today, we’re glad to help five new cities adapt the program and work to achieve similar progress,” Michael Bloomberg, the founder of Bloomberg LP and Bloomberg Philanthropies and the 108th Mayor of New York City, says in the press release. (more…)