The Sheltering Arms Foundation’s vision of success is that all Minnesota children with the least access to resources are socially and emotionally, as well as physically and cognitively ready for kindergarten.
To achieve this goal, we fund high quality culturally appropriate early childhood programs that support children’s social, emotional, physical and academic development with strong family engagement strategies. Eligible programs include innovative early care and education, targeted home visiting and parent education, or early childhood mental health programs.
A high quality early care and education program has the following elements:
- A 3 or 4 star Parent Aware rating or is on a pathway to attain it
- A research based high quality curriculum
- Opportunities for family engagement in programming
- Quality assessment tools where data informs program improvement
- Access to professional development for staff that supports growth in their job in areas such as: program design, evaluation and assessment, inter-cultural skills, and child development.
A high quality parent education and targeted home visiting program has the following elements:
- A focus on strength-based whole child and family development that includes cognitive, physical, social and emotional development
- A research based high quality curriculum and evidenced based model
- A parent-child interaction component
- Active involvement of parents/caregivers in their child’s learning process
- Intensity and duration of contact appropriate for goals of the program
- Quality assessment tools where data informs program improvement
- Access to professional development for staff that supports growth in their job in areas such as: program design, evaluation and assessment, inter-cultural skills, and child development.
A high quality early childhood mental health program has the following elements:
- Priority given to mental health programs that align with high quality early care education and targeted home visiting programs.
- Primary focus on Relationships
- Culturally appropriate interventions
- Research based high quality methodology
- Opportunities for family engagement in programming
- Initial assessment of each child including for trauma and chronic stress
- Intensity and duration of client services appropriate to the goals of the intervention
- Quality assessment tools where data informs program improvement
- Access to professional development for staff that supports growth in their job in areas such as: new developments in early childhood mental health treatments, program design, evaluation and assessment, and inter-cultural skills.