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In This Issue
Parent Leaders Determining Direction for Statewide Workgroup
At the first SFI Leadership Team meeting, Jeffrey Scott, a member and parent leader, told the initiative that parents needed to be a primary audience for the Strengthening Families approach and materials. SFI has been acting on that advice ever since by working with parents to develop the Love Is Not Enough public awareness campaign and Parent Café process. In addition, SFI’s Leadership Team called on the initiative to form a Parent Engagement Workgroup to play an advisory role parallel to that of the Leadership Team, ensuring meaningful parent voice in all of the initiative’s policy and program planning.
As the previous year came to a close, SFI selected its Parent Engagement Workgroup after a nomination process. In addition to the workgroup, SFI also formed a Cafe team of parent leaders to help meet the growing demand for Parent Cafes in Illinois. Members of this team included individuals that had participated in the cafes series and had a strong desire to offer cafes in their own communities. After completing Parent Leadership Training and a Parent Café Training Institute, they could bring the process back to their communities and increase SFI’s capacity to provide cafes when requested. The development of regional cafes teams like this has been a goal since Parent Cafes were first developed.
Both groups met in July and August to begin developing a plan and scope of work for the year and after the initial meetings, members of each have decided to vote on whether to combine their efforts to form a larger Parent Leadership Team that will serve two functions: 1) a Parent Advisory Group to ensure that Strengthening Families Illinois work meets the needs of parents; and 2) a team of parents willing and able to bring the Love Is Not Enough Parent Cafes to communities across Illinois.
The new idea came about after discussions with parent cafe team and parent engagement workgroup members. Since there was overlap among the two groups, it didn’t make sense to have both taking on similar work and it was challenging to make the distinction among them. It also became clear that parents have great difficulty traveling for long meetings away from home. By taking a regional approach, parents will be able to meet locally in or near their communities and send representatives to the in-person meetings called by SFI. These individuals would not necessarily have to be the same person each time and it would allow the initiative to maximize parents’ participation and contributions generating additional growth locally.
SFI plans to communicate statewide with this group primarily through email and the online community networking tool Facebook, which will also be voted on amongst the team of parents. In discussion with team members, there appears to be consensus that email and Internet, while difficult for some people to access, are the only cost-effective way to keep people connected over long distances and build this community. Using Facebook will help to develop a virtual community that will be reinforced with future in-person experiences.
The two teams are providing their feedback on the new plan by the end of the month. In the meantime SFI has started offering Parent Leadership Training and will host the first Love Is Not Enough Parent Café Facilitator Institute in November. Moving forward SFI will be working to combine parent leadership efforts with other statewide initiatives like the Illinois Children’s Mental Health Partnership and Chicago Safe Start and a meeting is being scheduled in late October to bring these groups together to find intersections that will support each others’ work. Stay tuned for further updates as Strengthening Families Illinois Parent Leadership efforts continue to take shape! If you’re interested in getting connected to Parent Leadership Training or Love Is Not Enough Parent Café Facilitator’s Institutes, contact us.
Strengthening Families Illinois Learning Networks Kick Off School Year, Plans for 09
As summer has come to a close, Strengthening Families Illinois Learning Networks are kicking off the school year with strong plans for continuing to implement and embed Strengthening Families within their region. Each learning network developed a detailed program plan for the year which will help them address four key areas: embedding practice, network development, parent engagement, and collaboration with child welfare. And as the school year has started, they have started implementing their plans.
Embedding practice has taken on a more expansive definition in the current year, so along with Strengthening Families Illinois training, learning networks will be focusing on increasing staff awareness of what the initiative is and what it means to be a part of a center that is participating. Examples include Evanston’s focus this fall on the Strengthening Families self-assessment and action plan. In Southern Illinois, one of their goals this is to provide a simple pre-and post test after training and network meetings to demonstrate staff understanding of the protective factors and approach.
Networks will also be working on strengthening their membership throughout the year. Chicago’s network is expanding citywide to include all of the Parent-Child Centers housed in Chicago Public Schools and they are also reaching out to organizations that already have a family support philosophy and approach that is receptive to the Strengthening Families model. This will help the network promote Strengthening Families more intentionally across the entire city and include a larger universe of programs in Chicago that haven’t been able to participate up to this point because of their location. Contact us if you are a Chicago early childhood program interested in connecting with the network.
Parent engagement will continue to play a large role within the network and will illustrate itself through increased events that welcome families, more opportunities for parents to get involved in the learning network programs, and Love Is Not Enough Parent Cafes. Peoria is preparing for their annual Family Fun Event on September 25th which all of the network programs contribute to by offering food, games, prizes, fun, and information on services. Historically the event has welcomed close to 400 children and families. Click here for information on the event. In South Cook they’ve already offered Parent Leadership training to local parents and will be working on offering Love Is Not Enough Parent Cafes in the as the year continues.
Collaboration with child welfare caseworkers and professionals remains a priority this year and the new School Readiness Specialists at DCFS are helping bridge the gap with programs. The new staff have already made contact with the regional learning networks and have started attending monthly meetings. All of the network plans, like in Kane County, are including additional meetings and networking opportunities among program providers and child welfare staff.
Find out when SFI Learning Network meetings are taking place by viewing our calendar or visit our website to find contact information for each region.
DCFS School Readiness Team Pushing Early Education Enrollment for Wards 3 to 5
The new IDCFS staff working on local collaboration in SFI Learning Networks and supporting caseworkers in helping them find quality early care and education programs statewide are making a push this fall to ensure the enrollment of young wards in preschool. Since becoming oriented to their new positions this past spring, the School Readiness Specialists have been working across the state learning more about Strengthening Families and the regional learning networks and participating in training to build their knowledge and expertise. Their next big push is being a resource to caseworkers in helping them enroll all wards 3 to 5 years old into early education programs, with an emphasis on those participating in the Strengthening Families Illinois initiative.
They’ve been working to pull data to help them focus their efforts and be a resource to caseworkers looking for quality programs. Based on the initial data pull there are a total of 3076 wards between the ages of 3 to 5 statewide with close to 80% that still need to be enrolled. Over the next two months, the School Readiness team will be working intensively with caseworkers and case management staff to support them in finding early education programs for these children.
If you are a DCFS or POS agency caseworker that needs help finding an early education program, you can contact a member of the School Readiness Specialist Team in your region for help:
Click here for Jackie Rivers in Cook North
Click here for Nubia Rodriguez in Cook Central
Click here for Rafael Serrano in Northern Region
Click here for David Morris in Central Region
Click here for Michael Stripens in Central Region
Click here for Dock Conner in Southern Region
Local and National Partners Planning Strengthening Families Conference in Chicago
From January 21 to 23, the third national conference on Strengthening Families Through Early Care and Education will be taking place in Chicago in conjunction with the Chicago Metro AEYC conference at McCormick Place. Kids Hope United, The Center for The Study of Social Policy, and Strengthening Families Illinois are collaborating along with other Strengthening Families states to develop the program. The conference will offer concrete workshops on implementing the approach in centers, success in child welfare collaboration, strategies for involving fathers, the latest updates on evaluation studies on the difference that Strengthening Families practice is making in early childhood programs and more.
Strengthening Families Illinois and the learning networks statewide are populating a number of the workshops. In addition to traditional workshops, SFI will offer a Love Is Not Enough Parent Café and participate in a panel on the café process. Thank you to all of our learning network members and partners for helping develop the program.
For more information on the conference and how to register click here.
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rly childhood providers’ ability to engage families in their programs better as a starting point for increasing parent involvement. Over 1000 calendars have been ordered within the last 6 months and distributed among their early childhood and family support staff as a way to support those goals. 