"I just wanted to tell you thank you so much for having so much faith in me. All my life I have just wanted someone to believe in me and give me a chance to work and no one ever did. You gave parents an opportunity to step up and show you what we could do. As long as I live I will always be grateful to you for giving me so much support and guidance." ~ a parent advocate

About ELP

In 2001, The United Way of New York City launched the Early Learning Project (ELP), funded by the US Department of Health and Human Services/Child Care Bureau. In partnership with Agenda for Children Tomorrow (ACT), Child Care Inc, and Citizen’s Committee for Children, the United Way is working to create a more integrated and coordinated early care and education system for New York City’s children and families. The ELP is focused on the following goals:

Increase the number of comprehensive and full-day/full-year programs which combine a variety of funding streams such as Head Start, public and private child care, Universal Prekindergarten, Early Intervention, and pre-school special education.

Improve parent access to early learning information and resources in their communities.

Ensure cross-agency planning and coordination and the City level to maximize resources and improve service delivery.

To achieve these goals, the partnership is conducting the following activities:

Collecting and disseminating information on blended funding/collaborative program models.

Providing grants and technical assistance to programs to develop and implement similar program designs.

Working with government agencies, including the Administration for Children’s Services, Department of Education, Human Resources Administration and Department of Health and Mental Hygiene to identify and remove barriers to blended funding and comprehensive programming.

Creating parent information access points in the two target communities.

Convening the Early Learning Council, a forum for dialogue, planning and action among representatives of city agencies, nonprofit organizations, philanthropy and child care programs and providers.

IMPACT is being facilitated by the Agenda for Children Tomorrow (ACT). The goal is to create community-based Parent Information Access Points to ensure that families know about the resources available in their community and where to turn for information on child care, early learning and child development. Based on leadership and willingness by local providers to be actively engaged in the process, readiness of the communities, including capacity, scope of existing resources to build upon, and coordination potential, as well as the existence of related activities, history of successful collaboration and need, both Washington Heights/Inwood and Bushwick were selected as the first two communities to establish Parent Access Points, and the Bushwick center still remains active. Toward this effort, ACT and its local partners worked to highlight and understand the needs of parents in Washington Heights/Inwood in Upper Manhattan and Bushwick in Brooklyn, specifically:

where families go to get information,

how and where they prefer to receive information, and

ways to improve parent access to early learning information and resources at the community level.

Local Design Teams in the community have been developed to inform the conceptualization and implementation of the neighborhood-specific Parent Access Points. Representatives on the Teams include:

Parents

Early Intervention Program Specialists

Faith Based Institutions and Church Personnel

Child Care Resource and Referral Agencies

Hospitals- private doctors and pediatricians

Library personnel

Health Department

Community Board Members

Early Childhood Coalition members

Local community based organizations and service providers

1. Validate findings from Parent Dialogue conducted by ACT and the NYC Early Learning Project.

2. Inform the group of other potential key issues confronting parents in your community.

3. Determine to what extent the access point will be a portal or the point of information itself, and/or to what extent it will be both.

4. Think through and plan options to meet objectives of Phase 1 (Concept Formation) of the project as well as subsequent phases (Design and Implementation).

5. Develop governance and management structure for the project.

Parent Advocate Thoughts

"I liked the chance to learn something each month. Generally when you're a mom your're alone."

"The whole program is good...especially having Amy and Jen fighting for us and believing in us."

Parent AdvocateTraining

"The graduation was amazing for me. To receive a certificate and to receive money was incredible. Usually you have to pay for a training, but here they help you and pay you."