Fairfax County Successful Children and Youth Policy Team members meet. Photo courtesy of Fairfax County.
We’ve all heard the African proverb, “It takes a village to raise a child,” and counties exemplify this saying through the significant role they play in coordinating and administering services to their youngest residents.
The diverse set of community-based programs and services available to young children only underscores how vital it is for counties to unite these efforts across systems and leverage resources to make the greatest impact within their communities.
Building the Case
Often local early childhood groups have mixed beginnings; some groups become established based on a bold charge stemming from a national or state initiative and others are community-driven and form more organically, bringing together early childhood stakeholders and the general public to address a specific need or challenge in the community.
Local initiatives for children have also generally maintained a focus on an age range of zero to 5, zero to 8, or even cradle-to-career.
More recent brain science research at the Center on the Developing Child at Harvard University suggests a prenatal to 3 lens as an opportunity in which to make the most impact.
Commonly, communities house many local early childhood initiatives reflecting many different perspectives. But the challenge to move toward an integrated or collective approach that incorporates budgeting, financing, intake-case management or data collection and analysis under a set of shared goals is a steep one.
A vital first step that county governments can make toward achieving an integrated system is assessing their current environment and building an early childhood stakeholder group charged with applying a systemic lens to the work happening across their jurisdiction.
Recognizing there were multiple efforts to address broad issues, Fairfax County, Va., first convened its Successful Children and Youth Policy Team (SCYPT) in May 2013, assigning it the role of setting community-wide goals and priorities for public policy as it relates to children, youth and families.
SCYPT has helped to provide a leadership “home” for cross-system issues.
In the following, I will highlight some practical applications based on Fairfax County’s journey with its stakeholder group.
Stakeholders
Once community buy-in has been established there is typically a lot of excitement around the opportunity to generate positive change but taking time out to strategize before a launch is a vital step to the group’s long-term success.
When determining who and how to engage stakeholders, those championing these types of efforts should:
Consider how to best engage traditional and non-traditional stakeholders in the process such as community developers, parents or the business community; and
Analyze the various levels of engagement to determine if leaders, middle management and direct service staff are equally represented in the overall effort.
SCYPT found that it was useful to develop “job descriptions” to identify members’ roles and responsibilities. Members of the team come from Fairfax County government, Fairfax County public schools (including two participating members each from the Board of Supervisors and the School Board), and the community.
Community members provide the perspective of various sectors affecting youth well-being such as health care, non-profit, faith and philanthropy. As an example, SCYPT includes a community member appointed by the Northern Virginia Association for the Education of Young Children to represent the county’s early childhood sector.
Additionally, SCYPT membership includes three parent members appointed by the Fairfax County Council of PTAs, the Fairfax Head Start Policy Council and the Fairfax-Falls Church Community Policy and Management Team, which is a governance team for children’s behavioral health services.
To develop and implement strategies, SCYPT convenes task forces or partners with existing relevant coalitions.
In support of early childhood development and ensuring that children are entering kindergarten ready to succeed, SCYPT has endorsed several short and long-term strategies, including, most recently, the Equitable School Readiness Strategic Plan and its accompanying One Year Implementation Plan.
A specially-constituted committee of providers, parents, school administrators, teachers and other stakeholders developed the plan.
Establishing a structure
Consider the following: What kinds of structured teams have been successful in the community in the past? Contemplate the tradeoffs of a stakeholder team that adequately includes a variety of perspectives with the optimal size to plan and implement effectively and efficiently.
There may be an opportunity to organize a larger group using different levels of engagement through subcommittees where members can provide subject matter expertise.
In the SCYPT governance model, an executive committee, composed of the four elected officials, the deputy county executive, the Fairfax County Public School’s chief academic and equity officer, and two community-based members, helps to shape the agendas and make key decisions on process and structure.
Most recently, they’ve conducted a survey of over 60 coalitions and initiatives working on youth issues in Fairfax and will be using the results of the survey analysis to develop new structures and processes to engage and promote continuous improvement across all groups.
Keeping your group engaged
One of the greatest challenges in providing leadership to a strategic group is keeping members motivated and regularly participating.
Fairfax County has shifted its approach over the years to maintain engagement, but attribute three core components to their success.
First, they established an executive committee to tackle process and structure challenges of the group so regular meetings remain focused on core issues or specific topics.
Second, they developed standardized templates for reports and presentations, so the information received is consistent, received in advance and time-limited to allow for more time for substantive conversation.
Lastly, meeting agendas were organized to allow for quick, consent agenda votes on procedural items, more written updates and a focus on key priorities.
Creating opportunities for continuous engagement where individuals are focused on prioritizing goals, identifying service gaps and strategies, and driving implementation to address the root cause of community problems keeps members invigorated and feeling that their time is being used in a significant way.
Stakeholder groups can help to develop a variety of products such as conceptual papers for new programs, marketing strategies, topic-specific research reports, policy recommendations and data sharing agreements, for example.
Formulating a clear vision for the group with realistic goals and objectives will help prevent participants from feeling overwhelmed by a series of tasks or issues that seem too large to tackle.
Generating impact
Collective impact work is challenging, but once systems thinking is incorporated, the team can strategize to build capacity and act as leaders and advocates in the community. Building collaboration across stakeholders not only helps to strengthen and integrate early childhood systems, but also contributes to community well-being and opportunities for children to thrive.
Developing a cross-sector stakeholder team is a large undertaking and any organizational change requires an immense amount of time, commitment and relationship-building.
However, it is a momentous first step toward system integration, increasing investments for young children, and ultimately, affecting individual and community outcomes.