Regional Early Learning Committee
Columbia, Garfield & WallaWallaCounties
Steering Committee Minutes
April 19, 2007
Present: Dick Cook, Kathy McConnell, Liz McDevitt, Nancy Beekman, Roz Duthie, Judy Peasley
Dick Cook reviewed the agenda. There were no changes or additions.
Roz Duthie reviewed the minutes from the previous meeting. Minutes were accepted as written.
Updates:
Kathy McConnell: BMAEYC has received a $2,500.00 grant to help connect preschool teachers with kindergarten teachers. The grant will cover the cost of substitute teachers and refreshments so that preschool and kindergarten teachers can meet and visit each other’s programs. WWPS has agreed to provide a dinner .
Kathy reported that there is a need to collect data on where the children who are not ready for kindergarten come from. This grant may provide an avenue to begin that work.
Judy Peasley:WWPS is participating in the grant with BMAEYC to connect early childhood and kindergarten teachers. WWPS is also working with WWCC to apply for funding to continue the Born Learning project.
Nancy Beekman:BMAEYC is hosting its annual “How Does Your Garden Grow” Early Childhood Professional Development Conference this weekend, April 21, 2007 at DavisSchool.
Roz Duthie:The search for funding to continue Born Learning is underway. Roz has been connecting with other groups in other areas of Washington who are looking at early learning with a systems approach and are exploring community mobilization to improve early learning. There is a phone call the 4th Tuesday of each month from 3:30-4:30 pm. If anyone would like to join that phone call, please contact Roz.
Committee Updates:
Website: Michelle reports that the Early Learning Team website is up and running. Visit: , click on Resources, then click on Parent-Child Resources. The Early Learning Team website includes a place for agendas, minutes and meeting notices, a document library with a function to comment on the documents, and a resource page. There will soon be a page listing the members of the Regional Team and the Steering Committee. Michelle is working on obtaining an easier website address as well.
Data Collection: Dick shared some history of the Early Learning Regional Committee in order to focus the discussion. The group discussed the need for a clear definition of what the problem is in regards to early learning. One step discussed was finding out what is offered in our communities, finding out what services exist and who is offering them.
Forum:
An extensive discussion of the tentative outline for a forum was held. Each member voiced their opinion as to whether the group was ready for a public forum or whether it would be better to spend the money given by Governor Gregoire in data collection. A third option was to spend some money in data collection and some to bring representatives of the SELF group from ClarkCounty to Walla Walla to talk to the Regional Task Force and other community partners.
Next Regional Task Force Meeting:
Next Steering Committee Meeting:
Respectfully submitted,
Michelle Meyer