Supporting Kindergarten Readiness

On June 26th, 2023 Alamance Achieves kicked off its Kids in Transition to School (KITS) Program. The program supported families with students Pre-K to Kindergarten who had not received any formal early childhood education. Kiddos gathered together in their classroom from 9 am - 12 pm Monday through Friday at St. Mark's Church in Burlington, NC. The program concluded on August 4th with a graduation ceremony to celebrate the hard work of the students and all they had accomplished throughout their time together. At the end of the five weeks, a total of 18 students graduated from KITS. With the support of an ESSER grant from Alamance-Burlington School Systems (ABSS), KITS created a transformative environment where students and families could build on their existing strengths and cultivate new skills, setting them up for success in the summer before Kindergarten.

Students listen carefully as Ms. Laparys teaches them about letter names and sounds.

What is KITS?

Kids in Transition to School, or KITS, is an evidence-based school readiness program that was developed at the Oregon Social Learning Center. The summer program specifically aims to build academic, self-regulation, and social skills for children getting ready to start kindergarten, while also supporting parents with different ways to encourage learning at school as well as at home.

What is “School Readiness” and why is it important?

While it may not always be considered, the first few years of life are crucial to helping young children navigate their emotions, actions, abilities, and the world in general. School readiness refers to what kids should know and be able to do when they start school. The period of transition at the beginning of kindergarten can be a difficult time for students and families as they face changes in routines, environments, and peers. This time, however, can potentially affect a student’s overall development, so setting them up for success at the transition to kindergarten can have a long-lasting impact on the lives of children and their families. 

KITS addresses several domains of school readiness, including literacy (letter names and sounds, concepts about print), numeracy (recognizing numbers, counting), self-regulation (sitting still, raising hands), and social skills (cooperation, sharing, recognizing others’ emotions). 

KITS not only supports students but also emphasizes parent involvement in each lesson. Parents attended six learning sessions as part of the summer program. These workshops were aimed at helping caregivers foster peer-to-peer support, learn ways to encourage positive behaviors at home and school, and facilitate a smooth transition to kindergarten. By focusing on these shared domains, KITS prepares and engages not only future students but also the families and educators of our community. 

How impactful is KITS?

The KITS program models a classroom setting where students learn a range of skills, like raising their hand and taking turns, that are crucial to navigating their first year in school.

During their time at KITS, the students learned a variety of skills, from cooperative play and making friends, to problem solving and handling big feelings, and so much more. In just three weeks the children gained vital skills that they will be able to apply to everyday life as they enter kindergarten and beyond. The impact of KITS has been shown to persist to at least until third grade where students have demonstrated gains on early literacy, self-regulation skills, and positive changes in brain functioning and stress responses (Pears et al., 2018). Every dollar invested in early childhood education, especially during periods of transition, is critical to preparing our kiddos for future success in school and in life. 

Investing in our Future

We want to give a special thank you to the families and all of the students who have been part of the KITS program. They put their trust into an amazing team of veteran educators which included our site coordinator, teachers, and parent engagement specialist. We would also like to acknowledge and thank ABSS for investing ESSER funds into the futures’ of 18 students who will begin kindergarten next year and the following year. A special thank you goes to St. Mark’s Church for the use of their beautiful facilities and to Impact Alamance and Cone Health for providing meals and snacks for the students. 

KITS is one of the many examples of why community investment in education is so important. By making a shared investment in the children and families of Alamance County, we have the means to pave the way for better educational outcomes, stronger communities, and a brighter future where we all thrive.

Citations

Partner Voices: Ricky Hurtado

Ricky is a Representative for NC House District 63 (Alamance County) and Co-Founder and Director of Advancement for LatinxEd, a non-profit educational initiative in NC providing targeted, multi-year support to Latinx students and immigrant families striving for higher education and greater opportunity. He is also a trusted advisor to Alamance Achieves, serves on the Alamance Achieves Steering Committee, and has partnered on the Community Voice Project to expand community organizing in Alamance County. You can learn more about Ricky on his website, here.

What is something you love about your neighborhood / community? What makes it special? 

People are proud of who they are, where they came from, and want to share their gifts with you. Whether it is food, stories, or a place that is meaningful to them, I love how much people in this community love Alamance and their story. Not every community has that, so it's important we honor and cherish that as we think about how we build off of that to create a community that centers that as one of its core values.

What are your hopes for the longer-term future of Alamance County? What are your concerns?

My hope is that we can create a learning environment for all of our kids to see themselves in so that they can begin to dream about how they can contribute to our community. We have some of the most diverse schools in the state--by race, class, place of origin, etc.--that really make us a unique community. But if our kids are a reflection of our future, we have to ensure we are making the right investments so they are ready to lead. My concern is that we can be myopic at times and focus on the now instead of making the leadership and educational investments necessary that will bear fruit for everyone down the road.

What is your vision for education equity in Alamance County?

My vision is that every child and family, regardless of neighborhood, has the same shot in life. That means meeting students where they are and providing the resources they need to be successful, from cradle to career. If I close my eyes as I think about this question, success looks like every child at high school graduation smiling as they turn their tassels at graduation because the K-12 system did its job and produced critical thinkers that have all created plans after high school (2-year, 4-year, vocational training) and are ready to tackle it so they can contribute and serve their community.

Why did you decide to partner with Alamance Achieves on the Community Voice Project?

Lifting up the community's needs, concerns, and dreams is so important to LatinxEd--it is at the heart of what we do as an organization. After a while, as you do some of this work in the community, you begin to see the "typical suspects" at meetings, events, and formal engagements. But from my personal life and work in the community, I I know community gets together and discusses things happening in their lives in different ways and are invested in their neighborhood and school. Most importantly, they care deeply about their children's future. So what is the disconnect? For me, CVP is part of the journey of meeting folks where they are, finding out the answer to that question and beginning to create solutions for bridging the many conversations that are already happening in the community.

What is something you learned through your work with the Implementation Team that surprised / stuck with you?

The talent and thoughtfulness of the staff is beyond measure. The secret sauce to their work really is their emotional intelligence. Whether it is in a team meeting or out in the community, this team gets it and is focused on the goal: improving educational and life outcomes for all of our kids. Alamance is lucky to have such a dedicated team tackling challenges issues in education and building a community willing to solve them.

community roundtable series

Bringing together community members from across the county, the Community Roundtable Series created virtual and in-person spaces for thoughtful conversation, connection and alignment around system-level indicators

A sketchnote summary of the Community Roundtable Series, by See in Colors.

Our education outcomes are fueled by many things.

Per-pupil funding. School climate and discipline. Financial barriers to post-secondary enrollment. Culturally responsive curriculum. Family-centered employment practices. 

When students have everything they need to thrive -- when our systems are operating at optimal levels -- we can imagine what each of these indicators looks like. Per-pupil funding is high. Students of all backgrounds and cultures feel safe and welcomed at school. All students with a desire to attend two- or four-year college are able to, without facing significant financial barriers. 

Measuring these system-level indicators allows us to look at the big picture — the norms, policies and practices that form our local education environment. And we know that any of these indicators can move the needle on education outcomes. But which one do we start to tackle? What are our community’s greatest needs and wants? Where is there already synergy or movement?

In December, community members and advocates from across the county gathered at a Community Roundtable Series to tackle just those questions -- and begin the process of aligning around a select set of systems indicators. 

“That was most important for us to figure out, because if we as backbone staff want to support co-developing community solutions that address some of these indicators, then we want them to be indicators that community has chosen,” said Sylvia Ellington, Collaborative Action Facilitator for Alamance Achieves. “You’re going to be more willing to take that up if it’s about something you think is important.”

The roundtable conversations are the first iteration of a series that aims to bring together community members, advocates and field experts to identify priorities and areas for alignment. 

The series lifted up several themes, including:

• We have great teachers who are dedicated and engaged

• Minority-focused punishment fuels drop out and underperformance

• In a perfect world, we would have: smaller class sizes, diverse and well-trained staff, transportation and money for teachers

• We need to build partnerships between organizations and schools

• We need to address lingering issues and trauma of parents’ school experiences

See In Colors, a graphic artist, visualized these themes as sketchnotes. The visual representations help capture community voice and hold the Alamance Achieves partnership, as a whole, accountable to what they said. The visuals also enable staff to present themes that arose from the roundtables back to our community and partners in a creative and meaningful way -- giving much more context than a traditional report. 

A sketchnote summary of the educator roundtables, by See In colors

Responding to communIty, changing course

The series is part of a larger Community Voice Project -- a multi-year project to envision education equity with listening sessions, while also centering healing and restorative practices. The project is fueled by a co-development methodology, where community members, grassroots leaders and parents work alongside organizational field experts to design, implement, and launch efforts to address themes and structural inequities that arise from the listening sessions. 

The roundtables were not a part of the original plan. They were actually the result of a major pivot that happened when partners came to the table to plan the listening sessions. Together, they realized that many other community engagement initiatives were happening at the same time.

Partners had a tough decision: should we move forward with the listening sessions, potentially adding an extra burden to community members who are being asked to share their experiences and stories? And is there a way we can align efforts in the future? 

In order to be responsive to community, the team decided to pause the listening sessions -- and the idea for the roundtables was formed. 

“In the process of pausing, we realized that the listening sessions had several purposes,” said Lucia Lozano Robledo, Elon Year of Service Fellow at Alamance Achieves. “It was to gather community voice around education equity, and also to guide our internal priorities for the new year.”

Although not part of the original plan, the roundtables accomplishes a primary goal of the Community Voice Project: to create a shared list of systems indicators that could guide the work of Alamance Achieves.

“We decided to move forward with the roundtables as a way to begin having those community conversations on a smaller scale, to pilot what that would look like, and also because we wanted people to begin prioritizing some of those systems indicators,” Sylvia said. “We moved forward because we knew it would drive some of our internal work.” 

Creating Welcoming Spaces

In all, there were eight roundtables – two each for parents and caregivers; educators; literacy advocates; and partners on the Beyond the Classroom team, a group of local leaders who provide services for students outside of school time. And each group brought a different lens to the discussion. 

“We tried to create affinity within the group by organizing this based on people’s interest,” Lucia said. So when participants entered the space, they knew that other folks likely cared about the same things they cared about. 

This created opportunities to deepen the conversation quickly.

“We wanted it to be more of a dialogue versus Lucia and I talking at people. Some of the sessions were a bit smaller, with one or two other people talking,” Sylvia said. “There was a richness of conversation we could have going back and forth – it was really more of a discussion, and really fit into what we wanted that space to be, which was dialogue.” 

Using a Systems Lens

Although each group brought a different set of perspectives and experiences to the table, there was one common theme: a focus on the practices and policies that fuel our outcomes. 

“We tried to frame the conversation using a systems lens,” Lucia said. “So trying not to focus on individual or student-level performances, but how can we really begin to hold the systems accountable.” 

Thinking about our outcomes through a systems lens can be difficult — it’s often easier to think about individual actions or programs as the causes of our outcomes. 

By zooming out to see the larger picture — the policies, practices and systems at work — we can unearth structural barriers or systemic inequities that can lead to unfavorable cradle-to-career outcomes.

“Thinking on a systems level is a hard concept to wrap your brain around,” Sylvia said. As facilitators, “we tried to set that context and weave it throughout the conversation. We really tried to set the scene for them about why we were asking them to prioritize systems indicators and how that changes the way that we’re developing solutions.”

Measuring systems indicators is a shift from how we typically measure academic outcomes — test scores, achievement gaps, benchmarks. By looking at the policies that create or exacerbate those outcomes, we can pinpoint and change practices so that all students thrive.

“How we define problems shapes how we create solutions,” Lucia said. 

This set of systems indicators was identified by StriveTogether, the national collective impact initiative that Alamance Achieves is part of. These indicators have been shown to impact outcomes nationwide, and communities across the country are aligning around them. 

Cradle-to-career systems indicators from StriveTogether.

What’s Next?

So what’s next for the roundtables?

First, a pause -- a moment of intentional reflection, learning and relationship-building.

“One of the biggest lessons coming out of the process and piloting of roundtables was relationship-building,” Lucia said. “We want to foster partner alignment to do things together, to do less and at the same time do better. We learned how much more work it actually takes to build the relationships to the degree that will allow for that alignment.”

But there will be more to come.

“I think I was both surprised and not surprised that people thought this was a much-needed space,” Sylvia said. 

Participants had ideas for how to take the roundtables into other spaces. 

“For example, one of the teachers brought up the idea of creating a group that meets frequently to have conversations like this,” Sylvia said. “How can we go to places where people are already gathered and continue to have this conversation?”

A core value of the backbone staff is to only ask of partners things that the staff is also willing to do. Leaning into this value meant changing plans in response to new information. It meant scaling down the listening sessions into smaller dialogues. And it meant learning from the experience in order to scale the practice to be stronger and better.

“There was a desire to be a part of a conversation like this, thinking about action but also thinking about systems,” Sylvia said. “Community is beginning to realize we’re having all these conversations, but nothing is happening and that’s really frustrating. Now community is becoming more comfortable with demanding to know what’s happening next, or what are we doing with this information. What are we doing with this, and how are we making this different from every other conversation that’s happening? Hearing the interest and enthusiasm was refreshing, but then how do we use that momentum now and get people energized to actually do something?”

Partner Voices: Shereá Burnett

As a member of the Community Voice Project’s Implementation Team, Shereá helps design and implement listening sessions to envision education equity, while also centering healing and restorative practices. In community, Shereá is a literacy advocate who is passionate about literacy programming for children, promoting the work done by Black and Indigenous women, and raising awareness about the issues impacting marginalized communities. You can find out more about Shereá and her work — including upcoming events and recordings of her Systems of Our Culture series — on her website, https://www.thiswomanswords.co/.

What is something you love about your neighborhood / community? What makes it special? 

I love that my family's legacy is so evident and still visible in this county. Personally, my family history and culture are tied specifically to Alamance County. When I drive through the County, I see places that my ancestors established and changes that they made from the Pleasant Grove area through the Snow Camp area. The fact that my ancestors helped to move Alamance County forward at a time when it was truly dangerous to do so inspires me to continue to make strides towards changing and improving the county as well.

What are your hopes for the longer-term future of Alamance County? What are your concerns?

My hope is to see more diversity in county leadership and amongst local elected and appointed officials. I hope to see us show a true commitment to assisting those who may not look like, speak like, or have the same history as us. I hope to see more diligent work to address issues like literacy, homelessness/affordable housing, domestic violence, and equality in medical care. I would also like us to work more diligently in addressing topics such as sexual health and education for our youth and establish additional resources for members of the LGBTQ+ Community. My primary concern is that those in positions of authority will continue to make decisions for those that they know or those that look/live like them and that this will continue the trend of everyone not having access to the same resources. Too often access to resources and privilege go hand-in-hand in this county. That leaves a large portion of the county to fend for themselves in the best way that they know how when the opposite should be true. As a community, we have a responsibility to one another and to future generations to come. I would like to see our county's citizens step away from making prominent names for themselves and focus on making prominent changes in and a better name for Alamance County.

What is your vision for education equity in Alamance County?

My vision for education equity in Alamance County involves us truly meeting children and families where they are, allowing families to truly be the experts on their dynamics, and providing more educational materials where children - particularly children of color - see their lives, their experiences, and themselves reflected. I am convinced that we continue to underestimate the profound impact that reading a book with characters of color has on a child of color. Too often we use the education system to label children as opposed to addressing the needs that exist for them and their family. We are too quick to pass judgment on children. Instead of saying that the child is talkative in class because the work or books being utilized do not interest them and we need to explore broader options, we label the child as a behavior problem and discipline them accordingly. Children start to equate school with a place where they are not free to be themselves and then we lose the opportunity to introduce them to topics and skills that they may truly enjoy. Education equity in Alamance County - to me - looks like seeing diverse books on the shelf that match the society that our children are growing up in. It looks like exploring alternate learning styles when the traditional approaches do not work. It looks like encouraging more than punishing, learning about families more than we label them. 

Why did you decide to join the Implementation Team? 

After serving on the Planning & Methodology Team, I had a vested interest in seeing the work we were doing progress and develop into something greater.

What is something you learned through your work with the Implementation Team that surprised / stuck with you?

I learned that there are several different communities working to be heard in the education system here. In my opinion, we would make more of an impact if we joined together to address the multitude of needs that exist for children from marginalized communities, rather than all of the communities trying to advocate separately, but there seems to be a gap in connecting all of the advocates. Needless to say, I am looking for a way to address this and I believe the Alamance Achieves' Roundtable Discussions may be a step towards establishing more of a network between different communities.

The Benefits of Music

Since 2015, The Young Musicians of Alamance (YMA) has been focused on breaking down barriers that keep children of low socio-economic means from fully exploring the world of music. The group was founded by Beth Bader after watching a 60 Minutes report on El Sistema of Venezuela. El Sistema began in 1975 with the mission to bring free classical music education to impoverished children to promote opportunity and development for these underserved youth.

Since the summer of 2020, Allie Arpajian has served as the executive director of YMA. Taking on this role during the pandemic has been challenging, but Arpajian also has found it has allowed for creativity and innovation. For instance, to keep the kids engaged she introduced a new program —a virtual bucket drumming class, which added about six new students. Currently around 35 students are engaged with virtual violin lessons, as well as general music classes. Enrollment for bucket drumming is currently open, and families can register their child at ymofa.org.

Traditionally, YMA has focused on stringed instruments and has a large selection of violins that, pre-pandemic, would be distributed to students in Title 1 schools in Alamance County. These students would then receive about 10 hours of instruction a week at no charge. The students are also given the violin to take home and keep for the year for practice. Arpajian says, “YMA pays for the upkeep of the instrument as well as lessons.” The value of the music instruction, instrument and its upkeep totals about $2,500 per child.

A partnership with the First Reformed United Church of Christ has provided YMA not only with a space for practice but also previously provided a sponsorship to further their mission. Pre-COVID, students reported to the church on weekends for lessons from 10 am to 1 pm. During that time the kids were also feed a hot meal. “All of the kids in the program are on free or reduced lunch, so this helped us to know they had a good meal on the weekends,” Arpajian explains.

Moving forward, Arpajian hopes to connect with Alamance Achieves to evaluate YMA’s programming. “We think together we can get some nice data on how the arts, specifically music is impacting our youth, how it sets them up for success — not just academically, but socially, emotionally,” she explains. The hope is that the data will let YMA know if they’re achieving the goals they’ve set out.  

 YMA also hopes to expand its reach further this spring, with a fundraiser to kick off a ukulele program, which kids have expressed an interest in, as well as preparing to find additional teachers for the fall, when hopefully children are back in the classroom. “There are so many benefits of music,” Arpajian says. “From increasing academics, to making kids be better problem solvers, to increasing empathy — there are so many things music can do for these kids.”

Encouraging Reading in a Virtual World

Parents and teachers across the county and around the world have been concerned about the toll that virtual learning is having on students. After a conversation with a friend who authored a children’s book, Shereá Burnett decided she could do something to help in Alamance County. She reached out to some other friends on social media about showcasing authors of color reading their children’s books on Zoom or Facebook. “My thought was that children of color may find inspiration to read and even to explore their goals by seeing characters and authors who look like them,” she says.

It didn’t take long for Burnett’s virtual reading event to get off the ground. “There was a lot of excitement about the idea, so I facilitated a planning meeting and the ball started rolling from there,” Burnett explains. While initially the goal was to only have the series last through Black History Month, she says it is now scheduled to go through mid-May.

By having the event videos on Facebook, parents and teachers are able to play the videos for children either as they are working with them during the school day, as a stand-alone activity or as a bedtime story in the days following the live event. Each book that has been read provides important messages and lessons for the youth. Best of all, they are learning in a fun, more relaxed setting while being kept safe from COVID exposure.

The virtual reading event doesn’t target a specific age group, but the majority of the authors have written or read books that are targeted to elementary or middle school-aged children.

The event has several co-sponsors: Alamance Achieves; Allied Churches of Alamance County, Inc.; Burnett’s Chapel Christian Church; Ellena N. Gean Books (Adrienne Barr); Future Alamance; Genesis Child Development Center; The K.E.Y.A. Foundation; ThisWomansWords (Shereá Burnett); and the WNCC Western District Social Action Commission (Reverend Tamara Kersey).

Burnett is particularly grateful for the support provided by Alamance Achieves. “Working with Lexy Roberts has been amazing! She has provided literacy resources for me to advertise during each reading event and has also provided wonderful information and opportunities for parents and school personnel to give feedback about things like summer learning,” she shares. “This provides our adult viewers with viable action steps for how to continue to promote literacy and/or to give feedback about things that are not working.”

Since getting the program off the ground, Burnett feels that the series has driven home the point of how important it is for children to see people who look like them in the books that they read or that are read to them. “It’s not just important during their respective history months, but all year long,” she says.

Questions? Email sherea.burnett@gmail.com

Spread Kindness for World Autism Awareness Day

Covering a broad range of conditions, there is no one type of autism. Autism,
or autism spectrum disorder (ASD), is characterized by challenges with social skills, repetitive behaviors, speech and nonverbal communication. It is believed to affect about 1 in every 54 U.S. children, according to the Centers for Disease Control. April 2 marks the 14th annual World Autism Awareness Day,
a time to bring attention to this disorder and how to create a kinder, more inclusive world for those living with autism.

The challenges of autism

Children present with a range of symptoms depending on where they fall on the spectrum in[SE1]  addition to the challenges autism creates for learning and thinking, it is also often accompanied by sensory sensitivities and other medical issues. These may include gastrointestinal (GI) disorders, seizures or sleep disorders, and mental health challenges such as anxiety, depression and attention issues.

Most children begin to show signs of ASD around the ages of 2 or 3. It is possible for some developmental delays to appear even earlier, around 18 months. Research has shown people with autism have more positive outcomes the earlier they are diagnosed and receive interventions.

A mother searches for answers

Cheryl Leath knew from an early age that her son Kaison was different. “He was different from my two older kids; he was the quietest child,” she explains. At first she thought he had hearing issues because he wasn’t doing the call and response he should have been or babbling by his first-year checkup. “I told the doctor I think there is something going on with him but I couldn’t put my finger on it,” Leath recalls.

 When Kaison was a few months older, Leath took him for a hearing test. The audiologist told her that Kaison could hear, that something else was going on and Leath should trust her instincts. At the next visit with the pediatrician, Leath again voiced her concerns and the doctor connected her with the Child Development Service Agency (CDSA). They performed a lengthy evaluation of Kaison before telling the Leaths they were “90% sure that what your child is experiencing is autism spectrum disorder.”

 Leath experienced a range of emotions that day, but since Kaison’s diagnosis she’s found her own way forward. “I’ve been very open about it with him — trying to explain things,” she says. Kaison was nonverbal until about four-and-a-half years old, but he was able to be mainstreamed into kindergarten and is now preparing to transition into middle school. “I approach him like he’s a regular kid, but if something doesn’t work for him, I ask him why and give him a chance to explain,” she says. “I talk about him being wired differently, and tell him if something doesn’t work for you, tell me why and I’m ok with that.”

Living with autism

On average, autism costs an estimated $60,000 a year through childhood. Most of these costs come from special services a child may need, as well as lost wages parents experience because of increased demands on their time from caring for their child with ASD. Costs only increase if the child’s intellectual disability is more severe.

Children with autism can design an IEP via the exception children’s department of most public schools while in schools to receive services to help meet their learning needs. Leath’s son Kaison was able to join a preliminary research in Chapel Hill before he began school that provided 26 weeks of in-home support with a speech therapist, an occupational therapist and a behavioral therapist. Leath changed from first to third shift to be there during the visits, which happened several days a week.

AustismSpeaks.org estimates that over the next decade, an estimated 707,000 to 1,116,000 teens with ASD will enter adulthood and age out of school-based autism services. 

 Currently, there is no one cause or reason why a child develops autism. In fact, research has indicated that ASD develops from a combination of factors — both genetic and environmental. Each person with autism will have his or her own unique set of strengths and challenges in terms of learning, thinking and problem-solving. Some may be severely challenged and need significant support in their daily lives. Others may require less support and be able to live all on their own. But all people with autism deserve the opportunity to reach their full potential.