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Thank you for joining us!
Desmond P. Kelly MD Nurturing Developing Minds Conference 2024
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Gary Glickman (Immediate Past ICS Board Chair), Dr. Desmond P. Kelly (ICS Board Member), Jill Kelly, Dr. Beth Pontari (Furman University), and Loretta Crowley (Furman University). | |
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Thank you to everyone who joined us at our Nurturing Developing Minds Conference 2024, cohosted by SC LEND! This event featured exciting presentations by early childhood professionals, as well as professional development and networking opportunities for practitioners and professionals in the early childhood field.
NDM 2024 was part of a 2-day event, Cultivating Lifelong Family Well-Being. This event was co-hosted with the Institute for the Advancement of Community Health (IACH) at Furman University, and generously sponsored by Prisma Health Children's Hospital and Prisma Health Education & Research Institute.
We would like to thank our sponsors of this event, including our title sponsors for the two-day event Prisma Health Children’s Hospital and the Prisma Health Education and Research Institute; NDM conference co-host The South Carolina Leadership Education in Neurodevelopmental and Related Disabilities (SC LEND); NDM event sponsor The South Carolina Developmental Disabilities Council; NDM keynote sponsor Greenville First Steps; breakout sponsors Julie Cline and Kincaid Retirement and Wealth Management; and reception sponsors Rosenfeld Realty Group, Count On Us Controller Services, Southern First Bank, the Bradshaw Family Foundation, Molina Healthcare, and Uptown Company.
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Citlaly Rojo (ICS), Nora Curiel Munoz (ECCA), Wykina Warner (ECCA), Melissa Passarelli (Help Me Grow National Center), Morgan Reiss (Help Me Grow National Center), and Taylor Bagwell (South Carolina Infant Mental Health Association). | |
Dr. Dee Stegelin with ICS Policy Research Fellows Dr. Bryndle Bottoms & Dr. Heather Googe (both University of South Carolina), in their session on suspension & expulsion in early childhood centers. | |
A room full of early childhood professionals trying out skills learned in a session on yoga & play therapy - doing "braindrops"! Session led by Dr. Jennifer G Hall, Dr. Jill Shelnut, (both Clemson University) Amy Starkey (Yoga-2-Go). | |
NDM 2024: Top Takeaways Blog | |
David Willis, MD (Center for the Study of Social Policy) presents on early relational health at Nurturing Developing Minds 2024. | |
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Megan Carolan (ICS VP of Policy Research and NDM event organizer) reflects on her top takeaways from the Nurturing Developing Minds event this month.
Key takeaways include:
- Collaboration Over Competition - A range of early childhood topics
- The Power of Pink - Early childhood advocacy
- HOPE - The importance of early relational health
Read on for an excerpt from the blog post:
"During his keynote on early relational health, Dr. David Willis spoke at length about the importance of early relational health and opportunities to incorporate this into our work. He spoke about going from ACES (Adverse Childhood Experiences) to HOPE (Health Outcomes of Positive Experiences). He shared the Four Building Blocks of HOPE, a framework developed at Tufts University, a partner in Nurture Connection:
- Relationships
- Environment
- Engagement
- Emotional growth
These are four elements found in research to have a buffering effect against adverse experience and trauma for families and young children. They also are threads that wove through many of our sessions across the two days. Everyone came to the event well aware of the challenges facing young children – but also, committed and determined to improve their ability to support them, to not give up in the face of systemic challenges.
Hope is what brings our attendees together, what they built up and refreshed throughout the event, and what they took back out into their work.
Thank you to all those who came together to hope with us."
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Newsweek Features ICS & Hello Family | |
Newsweek featured an article by our COO and General Counsel Bryan Boroughs, on how Hello Family Spartanburg saved a new mom's life and catalyzed a powerful network of services for an entire community. Read below for an excerpt of the Newsweek article. | |
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"A couple of years ago, in the heart of Spartanburg, South Carolina, a new mom was home with her 3-week-old baby, completely unaware that she was entering an acute medical crisis. The main symptom this mom noticed — we'll call her Samantha — was that she was tired, which is more than expected after growing a new life and giving birth. But Samantha's situation was much more concerning.
Spartanburg had just made a major investment in an initiative called Hello Family — focused on making sure every child born in the community has what they need to arrive at the schoolhouse door healthy, thriving, and ready to learn. One of the investments provides every mom with a home visit from a nurse in the weeks after giving birth.
When Samantha's nurse arrived, she quickly noticed that Samantha was experiencing more medical distress than she realized. The nurse called an ambulance, which rushed her to the ER, and they quickly admitted her to the ICU. Thankfully, 24 hours later, she made a full recovery. Because of that new investment by the City of Spartanburg, the community had a brand-new baby who would get to grow up with her mom by her side.
That's not the only win from the Hello Family Initiative: A recent independent evaluation showed substantial community-wide effects on every birth outcome evaluated, including NICU admissions, rates of healthy birthweights, and full-term births. Reducing low birthweight and preterm births is especially exciting because those two factors combine to represent the second strongest driver of infant mortality in the state of South Carolina. Seeing these effects across the whole community demonstrates the impact of this safety net of services for all young families, not only those directly involved in the program.
So why has Hello Family been so effective, and what can other leaders learn from its model?..."
Read the full article in Newsweek to learn more.
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ICS Team Member Wins
SECA President's Award
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Our very own Deborah DePaoli (ICS Palmetto Engagement & Policy Director) has been selected as the 2024 recipient of the President's Award of the Southern Early Childhood Association (SECA.)
SECA bestows the President's Award to a state advocate who has made significant contributions at the state level in the field of advocacy that supports children and families.
Congratulations Deborah on this impressive achievement!
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ICS Palmetto Engagement & Policy Director Deborah DePaoli accepts the President's Award of the SECA from Dr. Crystal Campbell, ICS Board Member and Executive Director of Dorchester County First Steps. | | |
Deborah DePaoli and Crystal Campbell with NAEYC CEO Michelle Kang. | |
Reach Out and Read in Florida | |
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This past month, ICS team members attended the Reach Out and Read Florida breakfast during Children’s Week at the Florida State Capitol, discussing the expansion of Reach Out and Read within the state of Florida.
In Florida, Reach Out and Read partners with 212 medical program sites in hospitals, clinics, doctor’s offices, alternative school settings, and federally qualified health centers. Reach Out and Read serves approximately 200,000 children and their families across 37 Florida counties.
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ICS COO/General Counsel Bryan Boroughs, ICS Board Member Loranne Ausley, and ICS Chief Science & Innovation Officer Dr. Tyson Barker attend the Reach Out and Read event. | |
ICS Team Spotlight: Research & Evaluation | |
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ICS offers a variety of services across the early childhood ecosystem. One area of our work is Research & Evaluation, which focuses on empowering early childhood programs to maximize their impact through measurement and evaluation. Here is a snapshot of several current projects:
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Reach Out and Read: We are working to understand the relationship between caregivers and primary care providers for Reach Out and Read's larger initiative to build early relational health in pediatric primary care settings. We are engaging in empathy interviews, conducting a semantic analysis of published survey instruments about family healthcare experiences, and developing a continuous quality improvement network within Reach Out and Read.
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Elevate PreK: Elevate Pre-K is a community impact project to expand access to early learning in the state of Arizona. We are leading evaluation work in the last two years of this project on behalf of Northern Arizona University and Candelen.
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Leading for Children: Our team supports design and implementation of - and conducts data analyses of - evaluations for LFC partners and LFC as a whole. We recently created an evaluation brief for their external stakeholders and are working to strategize on future data collection to best convey LFC's impact.
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LENA: ICS is leading a landscape analysis to help the LENA team explore how their innovative device for measuring early conversations can be used as a classroom or child assessment, and to support recommendations for market entry.
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TMW Center: Our team is leading an assessment landscape analysis and development of a psychometric evaluation plan, to help the University of Chicago’s TMW Center fit their tool into the field of early childhood assessment.
If you are interested in working with our Research & Evaluation team, please contact Mari Strand Cary at mscary@instituteforchildsuccess.org.
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Interested In Our "IMPACT Insights" Newsletter? | |
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The Four Scores of the IMPACT Measures Tool®
Four key components which determine the quality and fit of an assessment are: Cost, Usability, Cultural Relevance, and Technical Merit.
Cost: Determined by how affordable the measures is, and how easy it is to access.
Usability: How easy it is to administer a measure and to interpret the results.
Cultural Relevance: The extent to which measures are developed with different communities in mind, and the steps taken to prevent or address measurement bias.
Technical Merit: How consistent and accurate a measure is.
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Cost: The First Component of a High-Quality Measure
The Cost score of the IMPACT Measures Tool® refers to the affordability and accessibility of the measure. The cost of a measure can vary widely depending on the measure type, how it is administered, the materials and training required, and more. For many programs and organizations, cost is a primary factor when considering whether or not to use a measure. Despite this, it is not always easy to determine the entire cost of a measure given the many different components with various expenses. When determining cost, the areas of Price and Accessibility are important to consider. The overall Cost score of the IMPACT Measures Tool® incorporates these two concepts and helps to bring transparency and ease in understanding the comprehensive cost of a measure.
1. Price
Price accounts for the actual monetary cost of the measure. There can be expenses associated with many different components of a measure including copies of the measure itself, a starter kit or manual, training expenses, and licensure or subscription fees. Some measures have a one-time fee while others may have fees that are ongoing. It is important to consider all sources to have a comprehensive understanding of the price associated with using a measure.
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2. Accessibility
Some measures are free, but they still can be difficult to access. If a measure is free but difficult to access, there is a “cost” associated with the time and effort it takes to acquire the measure. For example, some measures can immediately be downloaded for use while others may require an account login or access to a published research article. To understand the full cost of a measure, accessibility is an important factor to consider.
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In Case You Missed It: Our Impact in 2023 | |
Thanks to your support, we've helped improve the lives of millions of young children and their families! Learn more about our wins below: | |
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Our Impact Across The Nation
Our wins:
- Served children in 26 states
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48 initiatives & projects
- Reaching over 26.5 Million children through the IMPACT Measures Tool
- Helping to catalyze over $866 Million for South Carolina children
- Reducing newborn ER visits by more than half in Spartanburg, SC
- Providing continuing education for 210 early childhood professionals
- Creating a Unifying Tool for early childhood systems
Read our full report of 2023 wins here.
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The Impact of IMPACT
IMPACT's 2023 wins:
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26.5 Million young children & families reached
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500,000 children served through early childhood workforce outreach
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40,000 visits to the IMPACT Measures Tool
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1,800 outreach attendees
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405 early childhood measures scored and added to IMPACT
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50 states where IMPACT has been accessed
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26 educational resources on measurement
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24 conference presentations
Read our full report on the Impact of IMPACT in 2023 here.
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Learn more about the IMPACT Measures Tool here. IMPACT is a free, interactive collection of measures to help early childhood professionals select the measures that are the best fit for the communities they serve. ICS created a science-backed scoring system to analyze the strengths of each measure holistically, including its cost, usability, cultural relevance, and technical merit. | |
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Our Impact In South Carolina
ICS helped catalyze.....
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$866 million for SC families since 2010
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$53 Million annually in new statewide preschool expansion
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$33 Million toward quality nurse home visiting
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$8.5 Million for Hello Family Spartanburg
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500,000 working families benefiting from Earned Income Tax Credit
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53,000 children receiving books from Reach Out and Read
Read our full report of ICS's 2023 wins in South Carolina here.
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“The ECCA (Early Childhood Common Agenda) has made me gain confidence in a way I never thought I could. Being a member of the ECCA means I have become a voice for those without one. Being a part of the ECCA means I have become someone I didn’t think I could be. I am a Latina leader working daily to advocate for positive change... I wouldn’t be where I am as an advocate, a leader, or a person without the ECCA and the continuing support and encouragement of everyone involved!”
-Nicole, Community Health Worker
“I think of ICS as being at the forefront of the innovation in social services - there is so much going on in the early childhood world, lots of evidence-based practices that service providers are thinking hard about how to implement and implement well in their community. I think of ICS as a thought leader and as a supporter of those initiatives.”
-Deirdre, Nonprofit Director
"ECCA is a ray of hope, for we are taking our lead from families, parents, and children who are living this experience... it has rejuvenated my spirit and determination to make learning and growing for our youngest children more developmentally appropriate and sustaining."
-Crystal, Executive Director of Dorchester County First Steps & ICS Board Member
“I will use what I learned to develop better ways to serve the preschoolers in my county.”
-Webinar attendee
“The IMPACT Measures Tool’s educational content increased my responsibility for workplace measurement and improved my ability to generate high-quality data at work.”
-IMPACT Measures Tool user
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ICS works on behalf of children from prenatal to age 8.
You can support our work by helping to
fund our research and advocacy.
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