Union Ready Start
2022 - 2023 BlueprintThe Union Ready Start Network is committed to building a strong local system of early childhood services. Union Ready Start is excited to help provide quality education to Union Parish children from birth to five years of age. We believe early childhood education is critical to a child’s development, especially the years before they reach kindergarten. Our goal at Union Ready Start is to provide each child with the best education possible so they can enter kindergarten well-prepared.
Union Parish is a network of publicly funded early childhood programs serving infants, toddlers and pre-k age children. Union Parish provides high-quality early childhood instruction and care that promotes educational experiences for children to enter kindergarten. Funds are braided to ensure the most access within each location. Using federal, state, and local funding, we provide quality care opportunities for children in Union Parish.
The Union Ready Start Network and its community partners are committed to ensuring all children receive access to high-quality education. The Network serves three Early Learning Centers, two Head Start centers, three Family Child Care Centers, one public school and one Charter School. We currently serve 211 at-risk students. Our public school serves 65 at-risk students, the charter school serves 20, child care serves 66, and Head Start serves 60 students.
Union Ready Start Network will expand its work to prepare the community for optimum outcomes so that more children will have access to quality early learning opportunities, and families will have the information they need to make the best decision for their children. The local community desires to leverage new dollars from foundations, corporations, and local, state, and federal government to support early childhood education in Union Parish.
As of the 2022-2023 ECE Site and Network Performance Profile, 174 children are enrolled in publicly funded seats in seven sites. The overall score is 5.20, a Proficient Performance Overall Rating. The Emotional Support Performance Rating is Excellent (6.1), the Classroom Organization Performance Rating is High Proficient (5.94), the Emotional and Behavioral Support is High Proficient (5.61), the Instructional Support is Approaching Proficient (4.14)and Curriculum Quality is 100%.
Union Ready Start Network strives towards bringing together partners to continuously improve the quality of and access to early childhood opportunities in the local communities in Union Parish. Local data and context drive us to:
- Develop intentional plans.
- Secure and weave together resources.
- Implement creative solutions.
To that end, Union Ready Start Network submits the following Blueprint for early childhood education.
Union Ready Start Goals
Goal 1
Continue to foster relationships with our advisory board of community leaders for the Union Ready Start Network.
Goal 2
Increase community awareness of early childhood programs to raise community support and increase the number of childcare centers in our district.
Goal 3
Increase birth to age three access to quality early childhood care and education.
Goal 4
: Increase Performance Rating in Instructional Support and Engagement Support Learning by 5 points.
Strategic Plan
Please select the green plus circles in each section to learn more about each goal.
Goal 1:
- Continue to meet with our eleven to fifteen community leaders of local and parish government partners, non-profit partners, for-profit partners, research partners, faith-based partners, grass philanthropy partners, and grassroots community leaders.
- Continue to develop our communication with an advisory board through communications and relationship building that will support a Union Ready Start Network Advisory Board and increase stakeholders to expand the early childhood coalition, thus increasing community awareness and the overall strategic plan of the network.
- Continue our advisory board structure so that the Union Parish School District Early Childhood Education serves as the governing body.
- Outline the advisory board governing process.
- Elect officers with their responsibilities and roles of board members.
- Department of Louisiana Ready Start Network documents
- LDOE materials
- Website development consultant to improve communications and community resources
- Community members to accept advisory board positions.
- Community leaders that will support the governance process and serve as ambassadors to promote and heighten the goals of the Union Ready Start and recruit stakeholders in the heightened awareness efforts.
- The Advisory Board was named in February 2023.
- The Advisory Board will have its first official meeting in February 2024.
- The Advisory Board members will elect the Advisory Leadership Executive Team in February 2024.
- Bylaws that reflect the network’s purpose, structure, organization and general membership will be submitted for board approval by May 2024.
- The Union Read Start Advisory Board will assist in creating a community marketing campaign to heighten the awareness of the Union Ready Start Network to heighten community awareness campaign by April 2024.
Goal 2:
- Implement a campaign to inform the community of the Union Ready Start Network, opportunities available for Union Parish families, the vision/mission of the community network, and information for supporting the programs for children birth to age 5.
- Provide direct contact with businesses, government agencies, religious organizations, and health centers that families frequently visit.
- Update the current website with new initiatives, Blueprint, and Union Ready Start Advisory Board.
- Promote early childhood sites and programs through social media campaigns, flyers, and brochures.
- Community partnerships with learning centers, community and business leaders, elected officials
- Union Ready Start Network website
- A campaign to communicate the network’s vision, mission, and purpose, thereby building new relationships and empowering hope for a better future for young children birth to age five.
- Develop a campaign to kick off the 2024 Network initiatives by the second quarter of 2024.
- Introduction of a campaign to community stakeholders, potential board members, and Union Parish School District partners by the second quarter of 2024.
- Schedule roll out of campaign by the second quarter of 2024.
Goal 3:
- Analyze currently shared and leveraged funding to maximize resources within programs and across the community.
- Continue to utilize grant opportunities from state resources and options to increase seat allocations for birth to age three at-risk children.
- Louisiana State Department Performance Profile
- Current Child Count data
- Braided grants to support birth to three-year span
- Continuing collaborative efforts with Network and community partners to assist in locating new sites to serve populated economically disadvantaged communities.
- Recruitment future early learning centers and efforts for birth to three years of age to increase enrollment.
- ASQ screener
- The number of infants to age three seats for early care and education will increase. The measuring tool will be October 1, 2024, and February 1, 2025, child count report.
- The quality of early care and education experiences for children birth to age three will improve, as seen through the Louisiana Performance Profile Report results.
- Screening of at-risk children as referenced by parent surveys and child care providers.
Goal 4:
- Implement Tier 1 Curriculum in all our classrooms.
- Obtain Tier 1 curriculums for all sites.
- Provide intentional, job-embedded, classroom-based coaching for teachers scoring below proficient on the instructional support domain and Engaged Support for the Learning domain.
- Louisiana State Department Performance Profile
- Current Child Count data
- Braided grants to support birth to three-year span
- Monthly meeting with program partners
- Continuing collaborative efforts with Network and community partners to assist in locating new sites to serve populated economically disadvantaged communities.
- Recruitment efforts for birth to three years of age to increase enrollment.
- Provide professional development training to retaining staff.
- Professional Development training for newly recruited teachers and retained teachers.
- Increased CLASS score in Instructional Support and Engagement Support Learning.