Message from Deputy Chancellor Dr. Kara Ahmed
Dear Early Childhood Community,
This week I had the privilege to speak with charter school leaders at the New York City Charter School Center Annual Pre-K Event! There was such a warm reception and collaborative spirit, with a laser focus on the work necessary to support our youngest learners and their families!
Chancellor Banks often talks about the fact that if children are going to have bold futures, they must have bright starts. We know that early childhood education plays a huge role in creating those strong beginnings for children. We also know that learning begins at birth, and so for those bright starts to be actualized, we are prioritizing the building of a comprehensive approach to a high-quality birth to five continuum across NYC that is inclusive of a mixed-delivery model and family preference. We all have a role in growing our next generation of children - from CBO center-based care, Family Child Care, Pre-K Centers and elementary schools, and charter schools. We are ALL partners in our collective work because ALL children in NYC are OUR children.
It is critical that we continue to work together as one early childhood community to make sure that all families have excellent, high-quality, educational choices for their children regardless of setting type. There are many opportunities for us to form collaborative partnerships across our diverse settings to elevate the work that we do! This entails identifying the best practices across our early childhood community and creating opportunities to share, model, and support our colleagues to emulate and replicate great work.
In my first few weeks as Deputy Chancellor, I visited Dream Charter School in Harlem and took notice of their incredibly inviting and warm spirit -- not just of children and their families, but among and between the adults caring and teaching children each day. I immediately thought of a district school in Far Rockaway Queens that evidences the same spirit and work and, therefore, thought it would be great for both schools to engage in an intervisitation and develop a mutual learning partnership. That was just me helping two great school communities make a connection. But imagine if we had intentional structures in place that communicated that invitation to learning across all of the early childhood settings we have in this great city of NY -- charter schools visiting family childcare providers, CBO centers visiting charter schools, district schools visiting CBOs, and more -- all in the spirit and intention of sharing and strengthening our collective work in service to all children and their families.
I am committed to developing structures and systems to foster these types of collaborations across our community and leaning into your insights on ways to make this happen. However, as many of you have heard me say, this is only the beginning. Over the last few months, I have been asked to outline my vision, which gives me pause. I entered this role with goals and thoughts for strengthening our collective work because I believe we have to co-create our vision together. We cannot and will not let things just happen to those who are leading this incredible work at the school and program level - our program leaders, our principals and most of all, our children's families. Our decisions have to be made together, ensuring all children and all schools and programs succeed and are in partnership with one another. This is my intent and my promise.
Thank you for everything that you do every day to lead our early childhood community. Enjoy the day and enjoy the work.
In Partnership,
Kara
