YCB Focuses on Early Childhood Development: School Readiness Success

On January 19, the Youth Coordinating Board hosted a gathering at the McKnight Foundation of more than 60 policymakers, early childhood providers and advocates to celebrate success through the YCB School Readiness Initiative. YCB Early Childhood Work Group co-chairs Peter McLaughlin and Paul Zerby honored the achievements and partners, after which Dr. Blanton Bessinger, Ready 4 K Board Chair spoke about the importance of investing in our youngest children.

The centerpiece of the event was a presentation by Dr. Scott McConnell, Director of the University of Minnesota’s Center for Early Education and Development. The University evaluated the effect that SEEDs Early Literacy Training (which has been provided at no charge to Minneapolis child care providers through the YCB’s School Readiness Initiative) had on child care providers, child care environments and children in child care.

The University found that the Early Literacy Training strategy did result in improvements in child care settings, and it also increased children’s gains on early literacy measures.

• They observed positive changes in both the providers’ knowledge and the child care environments.
• They found an increase in the rate by which children acquired early literacy skills in these settings, and a particularly strong increase in children’s language skills.

A related study that followed children from trained child care centers to kindergarten entry demonstrated that these children did much better on the Minneapolis Public Schools Beginning Kindergarten Assessment (BKA) than the average incoming kindergartner.

Other successes celebrated at the event, thanks to collaborative efforts under the YCB School Readiness Initiative:

• Trained more than 550 child care providers (both home and center) and home visitors in early literacy activities for infants/toddlers and preschoolers.
• Distributed 100,000 simple fact cards (“Talk, read and write with your child every day” and “5 steps to selecting child care”) to various community agencies and early childhood organizations that have contact with families and young children.
• In partnership with city, county and library staff, made plans to distribute nearly 14,000 free books and early literacy tips through community clinics in targeted neighborhoods, using the doctor as a “trusted source” to deliver the message about early literacy to the family.
• Helped improve the early childhood screening system for Minneapolis children by formalizing a city-schools-county partnership and simplifying the screening message. Efforts to promote earlier screening through a “Screen at 3” campaign tripled the proportion of children screened at age three.
• Developed the concept, connections and funding sources for a school readiness clearinghouse - called the Early Childhood Information Station - which will connect parents, providers and others with one-stop access to a wide range of programs and resources that support improved school readiness.
• Produced a baseline report on the school readiness of Minneapolis children, entitled, “So … how are the children?”. More than 2,500 reports have been distributed to legislators, policy-makers, early childhood advocates, community agencies and partners.
• Provided 57 TEACH Early Childhood® (Teacher Education And Compensation Helps) college scholarships and 184 REETAIN retention grants to home and center child care providers.
• Responded to the need for college preparation support, the lack of non-English speaking child care providers and financial pressures on providers with outreach, support and financial incentives.

Carol Miller, YCB Deputy Director for Early Childhood, closed by describing two new strategies being tested through the YCB School Readiness Initiative: PreK Primary Project and BEAM (Bridging Education and Mental Health). Both provide training and coaching for child care providers in dealing with early mental health and social/emotional challenges of young children. Results of these pilots will be available in late 2006.

The YCB School Readiness Initiative is primarily funded through a Federal Early Learning Opportunities Act Grant. For more information about this work, contact Carol Miller (612-348-8983, carol.miller@co.hennepin.mn.us) or Barb Nicol (612-673-2708, barb.nicol@ci.minneapolis.mn.us).

Collaborative Star Program Recognition
The on-site mental health clinic at the South Area Family Resource Center was recognized by the Minnesota Department of Human Services as a 2003 Collaborative Star Program in their annual report on Collaboratives issued December 2004. This is a collaboration with the Mental Health Collective that began at the South Area Family Resource Center during September, 2002. The clinic was fully implemented during 2003 which was reflected by an over 100% increase from 2002 in the number of children seen for individual therapy. An actual on-site clinic provides increased access to the mental health providers for the referral sources, other school staff, and the families and children. The agency has increased their staffing of the clinic as the need increased and it is now open full-time. 1029 children benefited from this collaboration in 2003.

Correction: Phat Summer 2004
Phat Summer, a free evening recreation program for 12 – 18 year olds that provides safe and positive activities for Minneapolis youth, is a collaboration between Minneapolis Park & Recreation Board, Minneapolis Public Schools Community Education and the Minneapolis Youth Coordinating Board. The December 2004 issue of YCB Update listed the number of youth served in 2004 as 3,000. The actual number of youth who participated in Phat Summer in 2004 was 4,072. The program was implemented for eight weeks, one to three nights a week.