Exciting innovation in the Northland!

I returned Wednesday from a great little jaunt up to Grand Rapids. In case you're wondering, there's about two inches of snow on the ground, just enough to make everything winter-y beautiful! I was up there with other Ready 4 K staff to visit the Invest Early program. Invest Early works to provide a complete early childhood experience for children 0-5 and their families in Itasca County, Minnesota. Invest Early combines Head Start, School Readiness and child care into one streamlined program. Core services of the program are infant/toddler classrooms, preschool classrooms, parent education and health services. There are other services based on the needs of the family; including Adult Basic Ed, transportation, and wrap-around child care.

To me, one of the best things about Invest Early (aside from providing quality early learning for the community's youngest citizens) is the simple, stream-lined application form. This application is great because it makes things so easy for the families. They don't have to worry about filling out multiple, long, complicated forms. Then, the staff from Invest Early assess the applications and decide if the child will be designated as Head Start or School Readiness. Sometimes, families don't even know how their child is designated.

Invest Early is a great example of what Ready 4 K proposed in the 2007 legislative session as Early Childhood Community Hubs, part of our E-12 Linkages Bill. The goal is to have a simple, coordinated systems for families. Invest Early would not be possible without the support of the Blandin Foundation. The investment per child is significant, but Blandin is hoping to show that this early investment will make a difference in the Itasca area over the long-term. Blandin is working with Wilder Research on a longitudinal study of the program.

It was very exciting to talk with the leaders of the Invest Early program. One thing they stressed, though, is that this kind of collaboration does take a lot of time and a lot of trust among all the players. The good news is that it works!

To finish off the trip, we attended the Grand Rapids Thunderhawks versus the Cloquet-Esko-Carlton Lumberjacks boys high school hockey game. The teams tied 2-2 after a very exciting match-up (my first live hockey experience in Minnesota).