RALEIGH, NC—Twelve Smart Start leaders from across the state have been chosen to participate in a statewide early childhood leadership program. The Smart Start Leaders’ Collaborative is a new initiative funded by the Blue Cross and Blue Shield of North Carolina Foundation and the W. K. Kellogg Foundation.

The program is an opportunity for Smart Start leaders to reflect, vision and plan for the future of North Carolina’s early childhood system. Participants will tackle difficult questions about how to best enhance the capacity of local partnerships and the Smart Start system to improve the health, education and well-being of all North Carolina’s young children birth to five.

Smart Start has seen its resources dwindle by $80 million in the past decade. At the same time, recent research by Duke University shows the more money invested in Smart Start, the better children do in school. Third-graders have higher standardized reading and math scores and lower special education placement rates in those counties that had received relatively more funding for Smart Start when these children were younger. Participants in the leaders collaborative will have to grapple with difficult questions of how best to continue to help children and families succeed in changing circumstances.

“We are investing in the Smart Start Leaders Collaborative because we know that Smart Start works and is a critically important resource for families with young children” said Kathy Higgins, President of the Blue Cross and Blue Shield of North Carolina Foundation.

The following Executive Directors were named to the Smart Start Leaders’ Collaborative:
• Denauvo Robinson, Albemarle Smart Start Partnership;
• Genevieve Megginson, Chatham County Partnership for Children;
• Eva Hansen, Partnership for Children of Cumberland County;
• Linda Leonard, Smart Start of Davidson County;
• Henrietta Zalkind, The Down East Partnership for Children;
• Sonia Gironda, Smart Start of Henderson County;
• Marta Koesling, Iredell County Partnership for Young Children;
• Steve Eaton, Partnership for Children of Lincoln & Gaston;
• Dawn Rochelle, Onslow County Partnership for Children;
• Jessica Lowery, Robeson County Partnership for Children;
• Heather Adams Kilpatrick, Rockingham County Partnership for Children; and
• Pam Dowdy, Wake County Smart Start.

The Brookings Institution hosted a panel discussion on early education, focusing on pre-school and the Head Start program. The event centered around an article written by Dr. Steven Barnett, titled “Effectiveness of Early Educational Intervention,” published in the journal Science. 

Watch the panel discussion on C-Span.

The NC Division of Child Development and Early Education (DCDEE) has issued the 2011/2012 NC Pre-K Program Requirements.  DCDEE revised the requirements to align with Judge Manning’s ruling, the Executive Order 100 from Governor Perdue, and the requirements outlined in the 2011 Budget Bill. 

Download the NC Pre-K Requirements.

Did you attend Head Start as a child? If so, the First Five Years Fund is hoping that you will share your story. They’ve created a new website called, Our Head Start. Why? Here’s what they have have to say:

We need your story to share with elected officials who decide the fate and funding of Head Start. Help show that your Head Start was everyone’s head start on building a better America. Stories selected to be featured on OurHeadStart.org will be entered for a chance to win an iPad 2. And just to say thanks, we’ll give every Head Start alum who submits their story a cool reusable tote bag. The First Five Years Fund will be judging the most compelling text and video stories through September 30, 2011. A winner will be notified on October 15th and will be featured on OurHeadStart.org.

Visit www.ourheadstart.org to learn more.

Superior Court Judge Howard Manning, Jr. has issued another groundbreaking ruling in the long-running Leandro lawsuit by acknowledging the pivotal role early education plays in allowing at-risk children to avail themselves of their right to sound basic education.

“The bottom line is that Smart Start and the MAF program-now NCPK (prekindergarten) under the present law, are intertwined in terms of administration, funding support and the continuity of early childhood services which Smart Start provides to the little children beginning at birth through age 5. Put another way, each at-risk child under age 4 that is receiving services from Smart Start will be better prepared, physically and developmentally, to benefit from NCPK’s educationally based prekindergarten programs when they arrive at age 4.”
Superior Court Judge Howard Manning , Jr.

“. . . the State, using the combination of Smart Start and the More at Four Pre-Kindergarten Programs, have indeed selected pre-kindergarten combined with the early childhood benefits of Smart Start and its infrastructure with respect to pre-kindergarten programs, as the means to ‘achieve constitutional compliance’ for at-risk prospective enrollees.”
Superior Court Judge Howard Manning , Jr.

Statement by Dr. Olson Huff, Board Chair of The North Carolina Partnership for Children, Inc.
“Today is truly extraordinary. For the first time ever, a United States court has said that a child’s ability to access his or her right to obtain a sound basic education begins at birth. Once again, North Carolina makes early learning history.

The court’s position reflects decades of scientific research that demonstrates that the brain is hard-wired for learning in the first five years of life. Waiting until children enter kindergarten, or even pre-kindergarten is too late.

We know investing from birth works. Judge Manning cited the 2011 research from Duke University that showed that North Carolina third-graders have higher standardized reading and math scores and lower special education placement rates in counties that received more funding for Smart Start and More at Four when those children were younger.

The ruling also articulates what those involved in the system have always known. Just as local education agencies are the system for delivering K-12 educational services, Smart Start is the system for delivering early learning educational services.”

Download Judge Manning’s Ruling.