Five counties (Elbert, Fannin, Franklin, Haralson, and Polk) in Georgia's Appalachian Region participate in the Georgia Early Childhood Initiative and gather data for five components proven to promote healthy children and self-sufficient families. Although the sites vary their approaches to implementing these components, the initiative is achieving desired results. The five components, implementation strategies, and results achieved for fiscal year 2002 follow below.

Universal Contact at Birth

Universal contact is the process of assuring contact with all families at the time of a child's birth. Early and periodic contact with all families may begin during pregnancy and continue to school entry. Community collaboratives work in partnership with public and private health care, children and family services, education, business and other community organizations to:

• Welcome and celebrate the birth of every child.
• Support parents in their nurturing and educational roles.
• Promote healthy physical and mental development for all children.
• Link families to community services.
• Advocate for unmet service needs.

Although 23% of families did not receive a visit, all sites have shown dramatic improvement since FY2001, when 41% of families were not reached.

Intensive Home Visitation

Emphasizing the importance of children's early years and the belief that parents play a pivotal role in shaping children's lives, these programs strive to:

• Promote good parenting skills.
• Prevent child abuse and neglect.
• Promote healthy child development and school readiness.
• Improve mothers' lives (for example, by deferring subsequent pregnancies and supporting education and employment).
  
  

During the past year, 708 families were referred for an initial home visit:

• 369 (52%) home visits were completed for primarily high-risk families.
• 339 (48%) were unable to be located or refused a home visit.

Close to 100% of children participating in intensive home visitation are reported as up-to-date on immunizations and well-child visits and linked with a primary health care provider. The number of families who received intensive home visitation services was 310, as compared to 152 families in FY2001.

Developmentally Appropriate Child Care

Especially among low-income preschoolers, participation in high-quality programs is positively associated with gains in cognitive test scores; better kindergarten achievement; lower rates of grade retention, remedial education, and special education placement; higher rates of high school graduation; and lower rates of juvenile arrest and teen pregnancy.

ECI was able to impact the quality of care for 413 children across sites:

• 180 (an increase of 15 over FY2001) children received child care scholarships.
• 164 (an increase of 25 over FY2001) additional children received care through an ECI child care facility.
• 16 centers received training that potentially impacted the care of 394 children.

Parenting Education

Research shoes that successful parenting education programs improve parenting skills at critical stages of child development. Participating parents often gain greater understanding of their child's development and needs; provide better nurturing and attentive care essential for healthy child development; select more age-appropriate toys; and spend more time reading to their children.

Of the 246 parenting education classes offered:

• 128 parents attended (194 mothers and 24 fathers).
• 75 parents (66 mothers and 9 fathers) completed a parenting education program consisting of 6-to-10 weeks of classes, an increase from 49 in FY2001.

Adult Education and Job Training

Workers must be prepared to meet workplace demands, have an awareness of job opportunities, and have an understanding of appropriate workplace behaviors. All sites partner with community adult education agencies for literacy, GED and English-as-a-Second-Language (ESL) classes.

Some innovative linkages are happening:

• In Polk County, young parents enrolled in GED and parent education classes have the opportunity to have lunch and play with their child during the day.
• In Franklin County, parents may drop their children off at quality child care just down the hall from the GED, literacy or ESL classes.
• In Fannin County, GED has partnered with the Home Visitation Team to offer in-home, individualized GED instruction for parents unable to attend an adult literacy center.
• In Haralson and Elbert Counties, parents interested in enrolling in adult literacy services may receive child care scholarships to attend classes.

The initiative enrolled:

• 709 adults (over 50% increase from FY2001) in adult education services across all sites. (Adults completing a GED totaled 55; adults completing adult literacy classes totaled 25).
• 138 adults in ESL classes.
• 73 parents in job training at three sites.
• 57 parenting teens still in high school.
• 8 teen parents from four sites completed high school.

These communities have made a difference. The positive results illustrate the importance of investing in early childhood and school readiness for all children.

The initiative has improved coordination and collaboration among service providers; broken down barriers and brought together social services with business and economic development partners; improved the quality of and enhanced access to child care services; and laid a strong foundation for sustainable community economic development.