April 2023

St. Louis Region 13 Community Leader Approach

Helping area families ensure their children are safe, healthy, and ready to learn!

Ready Communities

Did you know that the St. Louis Community has been working on strengthening the support offered to children and families as they navigate early childhood and school readiness for several years?

When we were first approached by the state of MO to lead a regional community approach towards school readiness we looked to the research that has been done to help plan for our future.

Two helpful and informative research projects rooted in identifying community need right here in St. Louis that we used to start the conversation were:

1. The First Steps to Equity Report
2. The University of Missouri Early Childhood Needs Assessment

These projects were complete prior to the COVID-19 pandemic and provided a deep understanding of the landscape for our children and families. Since then we have continued the conversation with families, schools, child care programs, service providers, and other community stakeholders to further understand the needs post pandemic.

We are now working within our community to identify and implement solutions to meet the needs of our children and families. One of these solutions is to increase community awareness of the needs. You can help be a part of this solutions by:

• Sharing this newsletter with someone you know!
• Sharing the research with someone you know!

As mentioned in the last newsletter one of our primary goals is to learn what meetings and conversations are already happening around early childhood in St. Louis. Take this short SURVEY to share about your meeting!

Ready Families

You have the power to understand all about your child's development! Their development is tracked by looking at milestones, which are age related tasks most children do at that age. We know all children and families are unique so it's great for families to have champions as they celebrate milestones and to ask questions about their child. Those champions can include teachers, child care providers, doctors, Parents as Teachers, and many others who support children and families.

Ready Schools

The MO Early Connections website tells us that ready schools provide families and children with the educational, physical and mental health supports they need to be successful. Ready schools include administrators, teachers, and other professionals who understand that children come to school with a range of readiness skills and are prepared to provide high quality educational programs for all children including English Language Learners, children with disabilities, children living in poverty, and children with behavioral challenges.

One of the indicators to assess for this type of readiness is that the district include policies for transitioning to kindergarten. One of the goals of the Community Leader work is to verify if districts in Region 13 have these policies and report findings to the Office of Childhood. We will be connecting with each district over the next month.

Get caught up on things happening with the Office of Childhood by viewing their most recent monthly webinar.

Upcoming Activities