The Power of Stronger Parenting
Teaching parenting skills and ultimately enhancing the care and education of our next generation is an ongoing endeavor that goes far beyond the walls of a classroom. These Collaborative for Children programs help engage parents, educators and caregivers in developing the strong foundations children need for lifelong success.
Baby Basics
Overcoming hardship from the start
Children with incarcerated parents and children living in poverty are some of our most vulnerable young citizens, often facing the compounded challenges of unstable family relationships, financial crisis, material hardship and social stigma. All too often we forget that these at-risk children need our care and support more than anyone if they are to overcome the odds stacked against them.
To help these children break the cycle, Collaborative for Children is working to improve the health literacy and parenting skills of incarcerated expectant mothers and other underserved populations. Our goal is to ensure that all children begin life with a healthy start and have a true chance for lasting success.
In partnership with the What to Expect Foundation, Collaborative for Children provides easy-to-read, engaging prenatal health materials for women and their families. We also encourage women to ask questions and become effective users of the healthcare system so they can better communicate with their healthcare professionals, increasing the likelihood of a healthy delivery. Finally, we support healthy infants by helping families create stable home environments and developing their parenting techniques.
College Bound - Beginning at Birth
Academic focus in underserved Houston communities
Houston's Sunnyside neighborhood ranks among our city's oldest communities. It is also known as a predominantly African American and Hispanic community where youth can be at especially high-risk. Much of this risk is realized when students struggle academically and ultimately dropout of school.
To help Sunnyside's youth avoid an undesirable fate, Collaborative for Children has initiated a program called College Bound – Beginning at Birth. A unity of family, educational, neighborhood and health care entities, College Bound – Beginning at Birth looks to significantly improve kindergarten school readiness, third grade reading scores and ultimately high school completion and college participation rates. The program is already making tremendous progress, where seven child care centers and ten family child care homes are participating in quality improvement efforts.
Based on success in Sunnyside, College Bound – Beginning at Birth will be replicated in communities throughout Houston. To find out more about College Bound Beginning at Birth, click here.
P3 Training
Parents as Partners in Preschool
Because Texas does not limit class size in early education classrooms, children often do not receive the one-on-one attention from teachers that they deserve. In an effort to address this deficiency, Collaborative for Children has created P3 Training. Through this program, parents become active, on-site partners in pre-kindergarten environments. In-class management assistance from parents allows teachers to devote more attention to individualized instruction. P3 Training consists of three modules – pre-service instruction before the in-class experience, mentoring during the service period and ongoing support/technical assistance. As an added benefit, parents who participate in this program often become more active participants in their own children’s education.
QualiFindSM
Finding child care
At one convenient online location, QualiFind brings together information on a variety of child care and early education programs in the Greater Houston Area. With QualiFind you will be able to determine which programs reflect the characteristics most closely linked to quality child care. These characteristics include teacher-to-child ratio and group sizes; center accreditation; family involvement; teacher education and training; teacher tenure; and compliance with licensing standards.
The easy-to-understand QualiFind system labels a given program's key characteristics as Excellent, Good or Minimal. For more detailed information regarding QualiFind Criteria and rankings, click here.
Begin your QualiFind Search Online.
To access QualiFind information by speaking with a Collaborative for Children Family Resource Specialist about Child Care Resources and Referrals call 2-1-1 or 713-600-1234.
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