Here we are, in the last month of 2020 -- a December unlike any other we have experienced. Despite the obstacles COVID-19 has presented, we are excited about the progress Ready for School, Ready for Life (Ready Ready) has made this year. Recently, we shared our updates via a webinar, Ready for Impact 2020, attended by 49 funders, board, and committee members. We invite you to watch the webinar here. The passcode is xb?Q0Y.= 

Here’s one important finding you’ll find in the webinar: our partnership with The Duke Endowment and Blue Meridian Partners has had an economic impact on Guilford County. Ready Ready is currently in Phase I of its strategy implementation -- which focuses on assisting families with children who are prenatal to age three. 

Nearly 70 jobs will have been created by the end of Phase 1, with nursing and home visiting positions being added in evidenced-based programs such as Family Connects, Healthy Steps, Nurse Family Partnership, Reach Out and Read, and our Navigation services. When we include the staff growth at Ready Ready, the number gets closer to 80 new jobs. And all these positions are focused on families with young children in Guilford County. When we include the 13 programs in our Community of Practice,  Ready Ready is on track to expand our reach to serve 11,500 families through our collaborative effort-- that’s nearly 50% of the estimated prenatal to age three population.

We would like to thank our funders, our partners, and the community for embracing Ready Ready’s mission. With your support, passion, and perseverance, we are looking forward to 2021.

• A contract between Children’s Home Society (CHS) and The Duke Endowment for delivery of Navigation is being finalized. This contract includes adherence to a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) between Ready Ready and CHS, which lays out guidelines for Navigation scaling and implementation.

• CHS has welcomed a new Community Navigation Coordinator. This new position will help cultivate relationships with OB and pediatric practices to serve as partners for Navigation.

• With facilitation support from UNC-Chapel Hill, the Navigation Steering Committee (NSC) is piloting a process to assess how the Get Ready Guilford Initiative (GRGI) values and principles have been employed in the NSC’s purpose, decision-making, and actions and how they may be applied with more intentionality to strengthen the strategy.

• A draft Navigation and Program Integration manual is nearly finalized.

• The NSC has approved a structure to move Program Integration Workgroup recommendations forward. Within this structure, Ready Ready staff is working with UNC-Chapel Hill to develop a process, informed by implementation science, to effectively move these recommendations to an implementation phase.

• The Duke Endowment (TDE) is finalizing contracts with HealthySteps, Family Connects, and Nurse-Family Partnership for expansion to full scale in 2021.

• The Continuous Quality Improvement (CQI) Working Group will convene on December 17th to discuss the results of the final evaluation report, learning from the first phase of the work, and inform the future vision of CQI.

• The CQI final evaluation report is complete. We will share the results of the report with our CQI Working Group, CQI Implementation team, and CQI Cohort 1 members in December 2020 and January 2021. The report analyzes the impact of coaching, documenting programs’ changes in practices, and helps us understand the role of performance measurement in the CQI work. The insights from this report will inform planning for our CQI scope of work in 2021.

• The IDS’s next major projects will center around the implementation of design improvements and data sharing lessons learned from our consultation with IBM.

• A small team, facilitated by MDRC, has started revising the Get Ready Guilford Initiative (GRGI) Theory of Change based on what has been learned through GRGI over the past three years.

• In November, Pam Bacot, Program Manager for Reach Out and Read Carolinas, was interviewed for the WFMY-TV Who’s Turning 2 segment. The segment is sponsored by The Basics Guilford. Bacot shared how parents can use one of The Basics: Read and Discuss Stories, to help build pre-literacy skills. You can watch the segment here.

• Now through December 27 you can view The Basics Guilford-themed tree at Tinsel Town in LeBauer Park in downtown Greensboro. This outside, socially distanced tree viewing encourages mask wearing. Learn more about the event from Downtown Greensboro.

• The Basics continues to be a resource to parents and caregivers who are now spending more time at home with infants, toddlers and preschoolers. See www.guilfordbasics.org for details.

• The Early Childhood Workforce (ECW) Advisory Group met in December to review progress and discuss opportunities for continued implementation of the Early Childhood Strategic plan in 2021. A legislative ask for 2021 has been developed for a pilot to support increased quality and teacher wages in early childhood programs in Guilford. 

• The work continues on an advocacy video about the impact of the pandemic and the essential workers who are early childhood teachers behind the workforce. A recent article by CCSA, a Think Babies NC partner, points to a recently released workforce study, the pandemic and the compounding impact on already low child care educator wages.

• Get Ready Guilford Initiative’s (GRGI) Phase 2/Ages 3-5 Design Team has two meetings in early December. The Design Team  is tasked with developing strategies to tackle both programmatic and systems change in order to improve outcomes for children ages three to five in Guilford County. 

• GRGI’s Phase 2/Ages 3-5 Advisory Team will hold its first of three meetings in early 2021. The Advisory Team members will work together to offer state, regional, and national expertise and experience in education, policy, and advocacy for young children to advise the Design Team and GRGI staff.

• On November 22nd, 15 parent leaders graduated from Guilford County’s first Community Organizing and Family Issues (COFI) Phase 1 training. The training supports leadership development and community organizing skills for parent leaders and was facilitated by two local parent leaders with support from Ready Ready staff.

• The Guilford Parent Leader Network (GPLN) is launching a 4-part workshop series titled Holistic Hustle: Meeting Personal & Professional Goals. The series was developed by parent leaders in response to needs they saw in their network specifically during the pandemic. It aims to provide information about meeting personal goals while practicing self-care and incorporating professional goals focused on entrepreneurship. The parent leaders coordinating this parent-led project applied for and received a $4,000 mini-grant from the Center for the Study of Social Policy (CSSP) to support the series.

• The GPLN continues to meet on the 3rd Monday of each month at 7 p.m. via Zoom. 

• With support and input from the GPLN, a Family Engagement Coordinator will be hired in early 2021 to focus on growing the GPLN and engaging family voice further in the work of Ready Ready.

• The Public Policy Subcommittee continues to develop a longer-term policy agenda and build relationships with key influencers.

• Think Babies NC, a statewide coalition including Ready Ready staff, will meet in December to finalize an early childhood policy agenda for state policy to improve outcomes and reduce disparities for young children and families. 

• A new infographic from Harvard University Center on the Developing Child illustrates how systemic racism experienced in early childhood gets “under the skin” and affects learning, behavior and lifelong health as another form of chronic, toxic stress.

• The Equity Strategies Committee has completed a 3-part webinar series in consultation with Tepeyac/Ambrose Consulting. The webinar series for the Committee and staff is designed to develop and execute strategies that center equity in all work. Staff and committee members also participated in a facilitated debrief session in December. These sessions will help inform future work in 2021. 

• As part of the Pritzker Children’s Initiative, Ready Ready staff will participate in a Child Trends Equitable Access cohort for the next 15 months that will use data to help identify where barriers exist for families and how to address them.