News You Can Use Week of October 14 2011
Keep the Window Open Campaign Begins!
NHSA is excited to announce the kick-off of our Keep the Window Open campaign! If you haven't yet, check out our video: One Window of Opportunity, narrated by Maria Shriver. In the face of rising poverty, the video makes an emotional appeal to the sense of hope embodied by an open window -- the window of Head Start. After you watch, take a look at our new site, www.KeeptheWindowOpen.org, and record your response! Find directions for helping families, staff and volunteers do the same -- we need your help to make this a movement!
Ask President Obama to Champion Investment in Head Start
NHSA has prepared a petition for the White House's "We the People" site. Please read our petition, sign, and pass it on! We need to reach 25,000 signatures by November 11th to get the President's attention.
Head Start Awareness Month
October is Head Start Awareness month! Programs across the country are celebrating in different ways, from parades to carnivals to open houses and other activities besides. Let us know what you're doing! We'd love to collect descriptions of your events and pictures that we can share with the community.
Successful Leadership Institute
Thanks to all of you who participated in our leadership institute last week! We had some wonderful speakers and have gotten very good feedback. If you attended and haven't already, we invite you to submit a Participant Opinion Survey about the conference and a Capitol Hill Visit Feedback Form for each Member of Congress you visited. Whether you made it or not, we have materials from the conference available online! You can explore them on our website here.
Training Opportunity for Abriendo Puertas/Opening Doors
Abriendo Puertas/Opening Doors is the nation's first evidence-based parent leadership and advocacy training program for Latino parents with children 0-5 years of age. The program was developed in Spanish and provides a linguistically and culturally relevant curriculum. Find out about training opportunities at our Parent Conference, including scholarships, on our website.
The curriculum is centered on the cultural values, strengths, and experiences of Latino families and uses popular education and folk wisdom. This approach engages parents at a very personal level and results in trans-formative learning. Through a unique "train-the-trainer" program, Abriendo Puertas fully prepares local community leaders to become facilitators in delivering the program to parents in their neighborhood.
NHSA will offer a three-day Facilitators Training for 20 individuals, December 8, 9 &10, 2011 in New Orleans, Louisiana in conjunction with our 28th Annual Parent Conference. Individuals who attend the Facilitator Training will be ready to deploy the Abriendo Puertas curriculm in their local communities and at regional and state Head Start/Early Head Start gatherings.
Applications to participate in the Facilitator Training Network can be downloaded here. Selected participants will be awarded a scholarship valued at $1,500. In addition, a stipend of $500 will be provided to the individual's agency to defray related costs. Participants' travel and accommodations must be provided by the local agency. If Participants' choose to attend the 28th Annual Parent Conference, agencies are responsible to pay those registration fees.
Parent Conference Policy Council Recognition DinnerPlease send us photos & videos clips of YOUR Policy Council. As part of our 2011 Parent Conference we will be celebrating the history and impact of Policy Councils on Head Start and Early Head Start on programs, communities and families. Send materials or questions to Julie Antoniou (julie@nhsa.org) by November 15, 2011.
NHSA Announces 2012 Scholarship & Award Winners!
The 2012 NHSA Scholarship & Award winners have been selected. Look for an announcement on the NHSA website (www.nhsa.org) Friday, October 21, 2011.
Let's get children outside with nature based education!
If you didn't get a chance to hear about Growing up WILD during the OHS conference last week, it's not too late! Growing Up WILD, an award-winning early childhood program for building school readiness skills through nature based learning developed by the Council for Environmental Education, is reaching out to Head Start educators nationwide with activities that provide a consistent, tested, developmentally appropriate, interdisciplinary teaching tool. Read more about the program and get access to a free sample activity on our website.
Growing Up WILD, an award-winning early childhood program for building school readiness skills through nature based learning developed by the Council for Environmental Education, is reaching out to Head Start educators nationwide with activities that provide a consistent, tested, developmentally appropriate, interdisciplinary teaching tool- helping educators to develop active healthy children who appreciate nature and are prepared to enter school with ample learning skills.
With 27 nature-based activities correlated to the Head Start Domains and easily digestible background information, Growing Up WILD provides Head Start educators with the knowledge and skills to comfortably teach nature-based education that includes math, science inquiry, literacy as well as music and movement.
Growing Up WILD's new website also features new resources to aid educators in the classroom such as Show Me Wildlife, featuring clickable links for viewing insects, bears, birds and more! There you can also find links for viewing workshops, activities and an introductory video featuring testimonials from Head Start educators who have experienced Growing Up WILD fist hand.
For more information about FREE Growing Up WILD training or how to order materials, please visit www.pwGrowingUpWILD.org. Be sure to download Growing Up WILD's free sample activity, Fishing Fun!, allowing children to engage in a dramatic play fishing game and learn about fish.
"At a time when children are so disconnected from nature and the outdoors, this educationally enriching program was the right choice at the right time. Growing Up WILD encourages hands-on learning and lots of movement and exploration while building on essential Head Start Domains. The activity guide is leader friendly, bright and colorful with loads of ideas for centers, math connections, vocabulary and music and movement. A wonderful introduction to using nature to teach our kids!"
- Lauri Morrison-Frichtl, Illinois Head Start Association
Yasmina Vinci interviews Arne Duncan
Right now on NHSA radio you can hear our Executive Director Yasmina Vinci ask Arne Duncan about the role Head Start programs can play in development of Race to the Top Early Learning Challenge applications and systems. Check it out -- and get some great safety tips, too!
Survey for Program Directors
On 9/9/11, OHS issued two Information Memorandums addressing Head Start and Early Head Start statutory degree and credentialing requirements and center-based preschool classroom teacher qualification waiver authority and procedures. We would like to learn the extent to which your programs are complying and learn about what challenges they may pose and how your program is addressing any challenges. Please complete this brief survey by 6 pm Pacific Time on Monday, October 17th. Click here to complete the survey. If you have any questions about this survey or this topic, please email Tommy at tsheridan@nhsa.org.
Upcoming Legal Advisory Service Trainings
Join Zoe Beckerman and Ted Waters for our upcoming training webinars, including Head Start Governance and our Governance Bootcamp series. The Head Start Legal Advisory Service, a collaboration between Feldesman Tucker Leifer Fidell LLP and the National Head Start Association, has developed this topic, as well as other new offerings designed with programs like yours in mind. Don't miss out on these upcoming, cost effective training webinars. You can register at: http://headstart.peachnewmedia.com/store/provider/provider09.php
Upcoming Legal Advisory Service Trainings
Head Start Governance (10/26/11)
Head Start governance has always been complicated. Yet in this day and age, it has never been more important. Maintaining proper oversight and accountability over the program is the name of the game. Join us on this online training session, in which we'll clarify:
- The unique roles and responsibilities of the governing board and Policy Council;
- Conflicts of Interest and Composition; and
- Considerations for your program to be in compliance
Who Should Attend: Head Start Management, and staff assisting Boards and Policy Councils.
Please note that we also offer a Board and Policy Council Governance Boot Camp On-Demand Series, designed specifically for Board and Policy Council Members (see below).
Governance Boot Camp (2 webinar series; On-Demand)
Every Board and Policy Council meeting is chock full of work to be done - ranging from developing goals, to approving grant renewals and policies, to ensuring fiscal and programmatic oversight. Despite the time crunch, both bodies still need regular training. Because we kept hearing from programs across the country how hard it is to fit in governance training into busy Board and Policy Council schedules, we've designed our Governance Boot Camp just for you!
This series is designed to ensure that you can provide cutting-edge governance training to both your Board and your Policy Council - in short segments that can fit into their regular meetings. Each of these two webinars is comprised of discrete, short topics of 20-30 minutes in duration. So you can show one segment at one Board or Policy Council meeting, and another segment at the next. The presentations are "on-demand" so that they can be watched at your Board or Policy Council's convenience. You can also use the same training segments for both your Board and your Policy Council -so you get multiple trainings for one low price. And, importantly, you'll have an extended time (6 months) to use each webinar, comprised of multiple segments.
Segments for Part 1: Governance Essentials
- Shared Governance
- Roles of Board and Policy Council
- General Responsibilities of Board and Policy Council
- Specific Responsibilities of Board and Policy Council
- Composition Requirements of Both Bodies
- How to Handle Potential Conflicts of Interest
Segments for Part 2: Process Tools
- Board/Policy Council Self Evaluation
- Why it matters and how to do it
- Considerations for whether your Policy Council should do this as well
- How best to conduct Board or Policy council meetings;
- Including tips on process; and
- When and how to use Executive Sessions
- Best Practices for Meeting Minutes
- Creating an Annual Board or Policy Council Work Plan
The Head Start Legal Advisory Service, a collaboration between Feldesman Tucker Leifer Fidell LLP and the National Head Start Association, has this topic, as well as other new offerings on topics designed with programs like yours in mind. To register or see the full list of this season's trainings, please go to: http://headstart.peachnewmedia.com/store/provider/provider09.php.