Ready Region North Central
Ready Region North Central
We are proud to have been selected as the lead organization for Ready Region North Central. As a Ready Region lead organization, we are part of a statewide network bringing strategic leadership and coordination of early childhood care and education (ECCE) services and resources to prepare all children and families for success. Ready Regions focus on:
Ready Regions focus on:
Strengthening Quality
We will ensure all components are in place to coordinate quality measurement and guide improvement in publicly funded classrooms as part of VQB5.
To prepare all children for kindergarten and in response to state law, Virginia has developed the Unified Virginia Quality Birth to Five System (VQB5) to measure and help improve the quality of all publicly-funded birth-to-five classrooms and support families to choose quality programming across program types.
All publicly-funded birth-to-five early childhood programs are required to participate in VQB5 on an annual basis. Programs that do not receive public funding have the option to participate. Details available on the VQB5 Participation Requirements webpage.
VQB5 Quality Profiles (with information about early childhood program performance on quality measures and other topics of interest to families, policy makers, and the public) is available at EarlyChildhoodQuality.doe.virginia.gov
Ready Regions coordinate and support participation in VQB5 for early childhood care and education (ECCE) programs in the region.
To enroll in VQB5:
Contact Pam Heppard pam@foundationfirstva.org
The Virginia Department of Education administers VQB5 as established by the Virginia Board of Education. To learn more, visit the VDOE Quality Measurement and Improvement (VQB5) website or e-mail vqb5@doe.virginia.edu.
Building Relationships
We will engage with leaders across the region to facilitate buy-in for shared accountability and benefit.
Ready Region North Central is committed to partnering with other organizations and stakeholders to implement this work. To do so, we have created a community taskforce that provides opportunities for local, state, and private partners to convene monthly to share and solve local issues that pertain to families and children from birth to five.
Ready Region North Central serves as the lead agency for the Virginia Business Roundtable for Early Education (VBREE) Regional Initiative to harness the power of cross-industry regional leaders to identify and implement solutions to child care challenges. The VBREE Regional Initiative creates a unified structure for progress across regions toward priority goals to build sufficient supply of child care and strengthen the early educator pipeline so that all families can access affordable, high-quality care. To learn more about the VBREE Regional Initiative, visit GetReadyVA!
To participate in VQB5:
Contact info@foundationfirstva.org
Increasing Access
We will administer Mixed Delivery programming in the region, and coordinate enrollment to help parents learn about and access ECCE services that meet their needs and preferences, while helping ECCE providers connect with and serve more families.
Ready Region North Central identifies high quality childcare centers and home-based child care to participate in Mixed Delivery.
VECF’s Mixed Delivery program provides public funding for ECCE services for eligible children from birth to age five. It helps address the growing demand for full-day, year-round ECCE services that meets families’ needs and preferences. Mixed Delivery also tests strategies to solve the tough issues that site leaders and families face, including increasing teacher salaries to improve recruitment and retention. To learn more about Mixed Delivery visit VECF’s website.
Ready Regions is working to coordinate enrollment across publicly funded ECCE programs in the region, such as childcare centers and home-based child care (including those participating in VECF’s Mixed Delivery program), Head Start, Virginia Preschool Initiative, and others to:
- Help parents easily learn where there are available spots for their children, what they qualify for, and information such as cost, hours, and location.
- Help ECCE providers keep enrollment numbers steady, communicate when they have slots available, and grow in ability to secure the resources for delivery of quality services.
To learn more:
Contact Megan Miloser, megan@foundationfirstva.org
Engaging Families
We support a Family Council, made up of families from across our region, who reflect the diversity of our region, to ensure the early childhood system is designed to work for families.
Our Family Council provides input on early childhood design and decisions, and helps our Ready Region understand and better meet families’ needs.
To learn more:
Contact Megan Miloser, megan@foundationfirstva.org
