Leveraging Strengthening Families to Enhance Early Learning Programs

Strengthening Families initiative aligns with Race to the Top Early Learning Challenge goals, focusing on quality improvement, parental engagement, and child development support. Key opportunities involve building protective factors, enhancing parent capacity, and promoting social-emotional development to benefit high-need children. The strategies emphasize family engagement, culturally responsive approaches, and collaborative partnerships across systems.

• Strengthening Families
• Early Learning Challenge
• Parental Engagement
• Child Development
• Quality Improvement

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1. Using Strengthening Families to Meet the Goals of Race to the Top Early Learning Challenge

2. About Race to the Top Early Learning Challenge More than $1 billion in competitive state grants Three rounds of awards between 2011-2013, 20 state Opportunities for public comments on goals, priorities and criteria Successful states: proposed ambitious plans and targets to raise program quality, improve outcomes for young children and increase the number of high-need children who are attending high-quality early learning and development programs.

3. RTT-ELC: Building Systems to Improve Quality Absolute Priority: Promoting School Readiness for Children with High Needs Application Centerpiece: Tiered Quality Rating and Improvement Systems

4. Key Opportunities in RTT-ELC Help families build protective factors and build parent capacity; Involve parents as partners and decision-makers; Support children s social and emotional development; and Leverage resources and build partnerships across systems

5. Help families build protective factors and build parent capacity Building Blocks of a high-quality system: Early Learning and Development Standards Comprehensive Assessment Systems Early Childhood Educator Qualifications Health Promotion Practices Family Engagement Strategies and Effective Data Practices

6. Help families build protective factors and build parent capacity Definition of Family Engagement Strategies: Culturally and linguistically responsive strategies [that are] are successfully used to engage families, help them build protective factors, and strengthen their capacity to support their children s development and learning Source: Race to the Top Early Learning Challenge, 2013 Executive Summary, http://www2.ed.gov/programs/racetothetop- earlylearningchallenge/applicant.html

7. Involve Parents as Partners and Decision-Makers Involvement in RTT-ELC planning and implementation Involvement in early childhood assessment processes and resulting decisions for individual children Guidance to support early learning and development standards at home Inclusion of family engagement and protective factors content in workforce competencies, teacher preparation and professional development

8. Support childrens social and emotional development Workforce Knowledge and Competency Framework includes effective behavior management strategies that promote positive social and emotional development and reduce challenging behaviors Health Promotion standards include involving families as partners and building parents capacity to promote their children s physical, social, and emotional health Competitive preference: Identifying and addressing health, behavioral, and developmental needs from 0 5 and building families capacity to address these needs

9. Leverage resources and build partnerships across systems Organization and alignment of the system to provide the diversity of services and supports needed by children and families Leveraging existing resources to promote family support and engagement, including through home visiting programs, family resource centers, family support networks, and other family-serving agencies and organizations

10. What RTT-ELC Grantee States are Doing 20 states received RTT-ELC grants 13 included plans to build on existing Strengthening Families work or initiate or deepen early-stage efforts Strategies align to the five core functions that support Strengthening Families implementation and sustainability

11. Alignment to Core Functions of Strengthening Families Implementation Build an Infrastructure to advance and sustain the work Build parent partnerships Deepen knowledge and understanding of a protective factors approach Shift practice, policies and systems toward a protective factors approach Ensure accountability Source: Core Functions Of Strengthening Families [link] Implementation, CSSP,

13. For more information CSSP Issue Brief: Using Strengthening Families To Achieve Race to the Top Early Learning Challenge Goals (2014): http://www.cssp.org/reform/strengthen ingfamilies/2014/RTT-ELC-and-SF.pdf Race to the Top Early Learning Challenge website: http://www2.ed.gov/programs/racetoth etop- earlylearningchallenge/index.html