All Districts — Funding from the Ready by Five Early Childhood millage helped the Great Start to Quality Kent Resource Center, which is operated through Kent ISD, launch a pilot program to provide real time, up-to-date information to families on openings at licensed child care providers.
If voters Tuesday, Aug. 6, approve a no-tax increase renewal of .25 mill for Ready by Five, the Great Start to Quality Kent Resource Center plans to seek a second grant to continue its child care navigation work. Early childhood organizations have to apply for grants or respond to requests for proposals to receive funding from the Ready by Five millage.
Kent Resource Center Director Jaimie Mueller said funding for the child-care navigation project has been its biggest hurdle.
“We’re super thankful for the Ready by Five funding — that it’s allowed us to start on this work that we have known has needed to happen for several years and we just haven’t been able to do anything about it,” Mueller said.
The .25 mill, six-year renewal would generate about $8.8 million in its first year and be used to expand access to early childhood programming. According to Ready by Five, the cost to an owner of a home valued at $300,000 would be about $37.50 per year, or $3.13 per month.
Filling in Gaps
The Great Start to Quality Kent Resource Center is one of 18 community-based organizations the Ready by Five millage has provided funding to since approved in 2018. Those organizations support 32 different early childhood programs providing prenatal support, developmental screenings, home visits, play and learn groups, elimination of hazardous substances, intensive therapy for children dealing with behavioral health issues and books to support reading at home.
Along with the Kent Resource Center, Kent ISD has received Ready by Five funding for Bright Beginnings, which serves families with children from prenatal to the time they begin kindergarten and for Help Me Grow Kent, which connects parents of young children (up to age 5) with local child development resources. Help Me Grow Kent is overseen by the Great Start Collaborative.
“The early childhood millage is really designed to fill in gap areas,” said Jennifer Headley-Nordman, president of First Steps Kent, which administers the millage for Kent County.
The millage does not duplicate funding or replace programs, but rather strengthens the entire early childhood ecosystem, Headley-Nordman said, so parents and children really get the most benefit before the children enter kindergarten.
“We know that birth to 5 is the time period that there’s really the most cognitive growth,” Headley-Nordman said.
Connecting Providers and Families
Great Start to Quality, a free resource, has two main focuses: helping licensed child care providers improve the care they give to children and helping families find the best licensed child care, preschool or afterschool program for their children, ages 0-12. The statewide program has 10 resource centers. The Kent Resource Center is the only center covering just one county.
Kent Resource Center’s navigation system project is an example of working to strengthen programs. Headley-Nordman said the improved system helps meet parents’ needs in today’s lifestyle because parents can find what they need right on their phones.
“So many times, resources have relied on a laptop or someone having to have access to a computer. We know that our parents are on the go, and we really are heavily reliant on our phones and so to be able to have something that really is meant for that type of operating system makes a lot of sense,” Headley-Nordman said.
The center’s $486,000 Ready by Five grant funded research which led to the creation of a child care navigation team. Now, families that reach out to the Kent Resource Center are connected to a navigator who provides support in connecting the family to a provider that has openings and other resources if needed, Mueller said.
A child care navigator then follows up with the family to make sure they have connected with providers and other services. The center worked with the Early Childhood Investment Corporation, which oversees the statewide Great Start to Quality website, on the project.
“We have had really positive feedback from families that we’ve supported through navigating child care and other community resources, and we’ve gotten really great feedback from the providers that are participating and texting us their openings,” Mueller said.
Helping Future Students be School Ready
In 2023, more than 14,000 children and expectant parents in every zip code of Kent County participated in programs funded by the Ready by Five Early Childhood millage. A small cohort of students who participated in those programs entered kindergarten last fall, Headley-Nordman said.
Headley-Nordman said children who have participated in some of the programs, such as Bright Beginnings, have higher reading and math scores when they get to third grade and take the M-STEP. They have also seen a reduction in preterm and low birth-weight babies and an increase in the number of families accessing assessments to determine if their child has a potential delay or disability.
“We’re seeing that we are catching more children earlier so they’re able to take advantage of different types of therapy, so when they get to kindergarten, often those children may need no special education services or may need less special education services than they would have if they wouldn’t have accessed the therapies and services that they did in advance,” Headley-Nordman said.
Basis Policy Research, a Grand Rapids-based research organization that is reviewing Ready by Five data, recently found positive trends related to kindergarten readiness for children who participated in Ready by Five programs, Headley-Nordman said. Two groups showing promising results have been children learning English and those who are African-American. As more students who have participated in Ready by Five-funded programs enter and move through the K-12 system, Headley-Norman said they expect the data to be more robust.
“I really want (people) to remember that the program is about ensuring that we have dedicated and sustained funding to support children between birth and kindergarten, because we know that research shows that those children that participate in early childhood programs and services are healthier,” Headley-Nordman said.
“They’re more ready for kindergarten, which means they’re going to be more ready for school in general.”
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