|
Dear Friends of Alignment Rockford,
It has been a wonderful year of change and growth at Alignment Rockford. With the goal of helping our children succeed and meet their full potential in Rockford, we have continued to grow our work in the community.
New Website! Have you been over to check out our new website? The new site has information for agencies and community members about how to be involved with the work Alignment Rockford is doing, but also has a new robust resource landing page that provides a list of resources and services available to families in Rockford.
Ready to Learn with the Basics Books With the launch of the Basics Illinois website, many providers from the Ready to Learn team collaborated in creating two books for parents and caregivers about how to incorporate the five practices of The Basics into everyday life with their young children. Available to purchase through Amazon, or directly from Alignment Rockford for a discounted price, the books put The Basics right into the hands of our community's parents, along with information about the online resource database and referral form.
Partnership with UW Health-Swedish American Through a great relationship with key leaders at UW Health, we have implemented a Ready to Learn with the Basics new mother kit program in their Mother-Baby Unit. Kits that include the Ready to Learn with the Basics book, a toy, information and resources is delivered to each new mother-- 3,000 per year.
Early Development Instrument-- Wave 2 The Early Development Instrument (EDI) is a a validated, population-based tool for measuring kindergarten readiness across five critical developmental domains at the neighborhood level. This year we completed the second survey in partnership with RPS 205, Harlem School District, and UCLA's Center for Healthier Children, Families, and Communities. We are sharing information from the EDI with community stakeholders and we would love to come to you! Please contact us if you want to schedule a gallery walk for your agency or business.
Looking Forward Following a strategic visioning process with our leadership, RPS 205 and the City of Rockford we have identified two critical areas of need among our students: School Readiness in the youngest learners and Social Emotional Issues related to toxic stress, trauma, and COVID-19 isolation and learning loss.
Alignment Rockford will be working to respond to these issues, continuing to work in Early Learning and Care through continuation and expansion of the Ready to Learn work and beginning work on the development of Social Emotional Supports inside and outside of the school day to support the safety and well-being of our students so their minds are ready to learn in the classroom.
If you are interested in being a part of, or supporting this work, please reach out to us today!
We are sincerely thankful for all of the ways that you have supported Alignment Rockford and we wish you a safe, warm, and beautiful holiday season.
Sincerely,
| 
