Learning and Ready to Succeed Recommendations

VISION: Children are surrounded by the support they need to be curious, explore, and engage in their own learning.

"Early investments in brain development will yield significant gains to society."

- Durham Early Childhood Educator


The system of people, institutions, and resources that support a child’s early learning at home, in the community, and in educational settings. This system is supposed to help ensure that all children are learning and ready to succeed.

Learn more about the components of our early learning system and the strengths, challenges, and opportunities to improve it in the report below.

18. Sustainability, Access, and Affordability of Child Care

Invest in a sustainable child care system to provide high quality, culturally affirming, and developmentally appropriate early learning experiences. We must invest in a comprehensive child care system that embraces the variety of settings that meet families needs, including Family Child Care Homes.

Strategies

The Recommendation: Invest in a Sustainable Child Care System to Provide High Quality, Culturally Affirming, and Developmentally Appropriate Early Learning Experiences that are Affordable and Accessible to All

The Strategies:

STRATEGY 18.1: Advocate for child care subsidy reforms that increase reimbursement rates and expand eligibility and affordability for families.

STRATEGY 18.2: Develop and pilot a local community awareness campaign about the critical role and value of early childhood education, across settings.

STRATEGY 18.3: Expand support for universal, affordable infant and toddler care.

STRATEGY 18.4: Secure additional investment in Durham PreK to ensure the program's sustainability and expand to 3 year olds

Why this Recommendation is Important to Our Community

Child care is a resource that is critical to both healthy child development and family economic security, but our child care system in Durham does not meet the needs of all families, especially families of color and families with low incomes. It is not universally affordable, accessible, developmentally-appropriate, or affirming of children across race, socio-economic status, and ability. A number of systemic factors, including persistent mental models about what child care is, who needs it, and the role that it plays in child development—as well as long-term under-investment—contribute to the problem.

Community Voices

  • “Efforts to ‘make visible’ Durham's early childhood education & care spaces (ex. children, educators, families, learning & care environments, the work happening there, etc.) to the rest of the community, such as through art installations, ad campaigns, etc.” - Durham parent

  • “How the heck is it 2020 and there are so few resources?! So many women have been forced to leave the workforce because of COVID. This is indicative of a greater problem which is that systems are not designed to support households with two working parents.” - Durham parent

  • “How can you get a job if you have no childcare? The social worker told me she found me daycare but that I have 2 weeks to find a job...but how if I have no childcare? Then the pandemic hit and all was lost. This is what I do not like about that system." - Durham parent

  • “Emphasis on affordable truly high quality childcare. We make a relatively high income and should not be struggling like this." - Durham parent

19. Kindergarten Transition


Develop a coordinated transition between early childhood education and K-3 education . The transition to kindergarten is critical and an opportunity to better prepare children, families, and teachers for success, while centering developmentally-appropriate practice, exploration, and play.

Strategies

The Recommendation: Develop A Coordinated Transition Between Early Childhood Education and Elementary School that Emphasizes Developmentally Appropriate Practice, Exploration, and Play

The Draft Strategies:

STRATEGY 19.1: Invest in the infrastructure to create a more integrated and aligned early childhood to K-12 system, working towards the existence of a comprehensive pre-K to 12 public school system.

STRATEGY 19.2: Strengthen the partnership between community partners, providers, families, and schools in order to facilitate an easier transition from home/pre-K to Kindergarten.

STRATEGY 19.3: Support schools in being “ready” to meet each child’s emotional and academic needs at Kindergarten entry and through the early grades, regardless of their early childhood education experiences, by emphasizing developmentally-appropriate and play-based learning.


Why this Recommendation is Important to Our Community

The transition to Kindergarten is a critical one, and there are many missed opportunities to support families during that transition in Durham. Depending on the setting that a child is transitioning from, the family may have little knowledge about what to expect in Kindergarten, and the teacher may have little information about how to best support the child. Alongside strategies to address root causes of educational disparities like poverty and racism, there is more we can do in Durham to help children, families, and teachers be better supported in the transition to Kindergarten.

Community Voices:

  • “Learning happens everywhere, and support for play, exploration, curiosity, and social interaction with peers/collaboration is beneficial for the child in that very moment, regardless of what’s next for them. We have to counteract narratives that children are in child care or preschool to “get ready” for kindergarten. Children need to be supported in their learning and exploration in the moment and age that they are, and when we do that, we see more developmentally-appropriate practice.” - Durham Early Childhood Educator

  • "I don’t know hardly anything about the school system. I need support. And I don’t really know where to go to find that information." - Durham parent

  • “Some children might be entering elementary school without ever having gone to a formal environment. It’s not just preparing the child to be academically ready, but making sure the school is ready to meet the child where they are.” - Durham Early Childhood Educator

  • "An extension of time to make the transition between PreK and kindergarten." - Durham parent

  • “Lack of alignment, communication, and collaboration between PreK and Kindergarten (teacher and provider level)” - ECAP participant

  • “Kindergarten environments in public school settings should follow developmentally appropriate practice and use a play-based curriculum. All personnel in school should be trained on how to interact with young children.” - Durham Early Childhood Educator

20. Inclusion for Children with Developmental Delays and/or Disabilities


Ensure children with developmental delays or disabilities learn in environments where they can thrive and their families have the support they need to advocate and care for their children.

Strategies

The Recommendation: Ensure Children with Developmental Delays or Disabilities Learn in Environments Where They Can Thrive and Their Families Have the Support They Need to Advocate and Care for Their Children

The Priority Strategy:

STRATEGY 20.1: Promote true inclusivity and integration for children with developmental delays, disabilities, and other high support needs in early learning experiences through a needs assessment on the State of Inclusion in Durham.

Why this Recommendation is Important to Our Community

True inclusion for children with developmental delays and/or disabilities is critical in all environments, however parents shared their specific challenges finding early care and education programs that are ready to meet the needs of their children and include their children in the learning space. They also expressed that they wished that early care and education programs were more aware of how to support their children with special needs but also how to help identify needs early to facilitate referral to intervention programs.


There is currently a lack of sufficient data to define and hold ourselves accountable in meeting the needs and preferences of these young children and their families. This includes a lack of comprehensive data on the current state of early childhood inclusion (and exclusion). In order to provide direct, individualized support to each child and support child care sites to meet children’s needs, Durham needs evidence-informed strategies to promote and facilitate inclusion.

Community Voices:

  • "Better funding/research based training about disability inclusion in all school settings (leads to better inclusion in community settings)." - Durham Parent

  • "Not needing to fight for basic needs for people with disabilities" - Durham parent

  • "Preschool teachers especially head start more equipped to care for and educate children With delays." - Durham parent

  • "Parents who already have it in their mind what to look for are able to get into the referral and care system to get diagnosed quicker. I wish more parents knew what to look for earlier to get their children the help they need." - Durham parent

  • "Education for parents and teachers for how to get interventions for issues like speech." - Durham parent

  • "More programs for special needs children and their families." - Durham parent

  • "Children with disability/special needs summer care. This is extremely hard for families to access." - Durham parent

21. Early Literacy and Play


Promote and support early literacy and play for young children starting at birth in partnership with families and caregivers.

Strategies

The Recommendation: Promote and Support Play and Early Literacy for Young Children Starting at Birth in Partnership with Parents, Guardians and Caregivers

The Strategies:

STRATEGY 21.1: Engage, empower, and build capacity of parents, guardians, and caregivers to support children’s early literacy development and play outside the classroom from birth.

STRATEGY 21.2: Expand, amplify, and strengthen research-based, play-based early literacy initiatives in school, child care, and community settings to strengthen community impact.

STRATEGY 21.3: Ensure that the single stop shop and peer navigators recommended in the Recommendation 3 ('resource awareness and service navigation') provide parents with foundational knowledge about early childhood development and early literacy and the importance of those resources that are available.


Why this Recommendation is Important to Our Community

Learning for children begins in utero and continues from birth. In order to help address disparities in educational outcomes for children, alongside strategies to address issues like poverty and racism, families and caregivers need to be supported to understand the role that they play in their children’s learning and the importance of enriching experiences from birth.

Parent quotes:

  • “Parents are the first educators of our children which is why we have a difficult task but very important so that we can have future generations raised in a healthy and clean home” - Durham parent

  • “We have Book Harvest giving children all over Durham free books because we know the value of early reading” - Durham parent

  • “One thing that stands out is the eroding of play and how crucial that is to learning. Sometimes there’s a sense that play isn’t tied to early literacy, but it definitely is.” - Durham Public Schools K-3 Teacher