City of Atlanta Mayoral Candidates’ Virtual Forum on Supporting Children & Families

GEEARS: Georgia Early Education Alliance for Ready Students, The Junior League of Atlanta, and PAACT: Promise All Atlanta Children Thrive invite you to attend the 2021 Atlanta Mayoral Candidates’ Virtual Forum.
Hear from candidates on how they plan to ensure that Atlanta is a city where young children and their families can thrive. Candidates will address questions about health, child care and Pre-K, trauma, family engagement, and more. 

If you would like to submit a question for the candidates, click here.
We will live stream this forum from the studios at Georgia Public Broadcasting.

Wednesday, October 6, 2021
5:30 PM – 6:30 PM

Action Alert: Once-in-a-Generation Opportunity to Address America's Child Care Crisis

URGENT: Decisions are being made right now that will determine whether Congress will pass a major investment in America’s child care and early learning system before a key window of opportunity closes.

The existing structure of America’s child care system is unsustainable. Most parents can’t afford the high cost of care. Half of Americans live in an area without quality care options at all. And providers can only charge what families in their area can afford, which often translates into near-poverty wages for early educators and ultimately an untenable business model as a whole.

Now is the time for Congress to address America’s child care crisis with a significant, sustained investment in our early education system to ensure every family who needs it can access the care options that work for them. 

Click below to contact your U.S. Senators and Representative and ask them to make significant, sustained investments in our nation’s child care and early learning system, even if you have already reached out! We need to ensure that Georgia lawmakers hear loud and clear that significant, sustained funding for child care and early learning must be a top priority!

#MakethePAACT: It’s Time to Promise All Atlanta Children Thrive

Led by GEEARS, PAACT: Promise All Atlanta Children Thrive is a citywide alliance of public and private partnerships working to improve outcomes for children in the City of Atlanta. The PAACT collaborative is focused on the following four priorities:

• Increasing access to high-quality early learning environments - This means supporting child care facilities and finding creative ways to help families infuse brain-building opportunities for their young children in daily life.
• Increasing public awareness and engagement - Learning starts at birth, and we all have a role to play to support the health and development of children in our communities. The most rapid period of brain development happens before a child turns four, so we can’t wait until children enter Georgia Pre K to wrap our arms around children.
• Aligning systems - How do families figure out where to go to get the help they need? Are businesses working with the city leadership and the school systems to support working families and their children? PAACT works to connect public and private entities to improve outcomes for Atlanta's youngest children.
• Building greater capacity to serve the health and well-being needs of children and families - A healthy child is a child who will learn and grow, regardless of their economic and social situations. Providing easy and affordable access to medical professionals, nutritious food, and learning how to stay healthy will start our children on the road to success in their academic careers.

Georgia Pre-K Week

In 2011, Voices for Georgia’s Children and  Bright from the Start: Georgia Department of Early Care and Learning, launched Georgia Pre-K Week. The goal is to emphasize the importance of quality early childhood education by providing opportunities for leaders to engage with Pre-K classrooms in their local communities. This year’s annual celebration of early learning will take place this week, October 4^th – 8^th. 

GEEARS Welcomes New Interns

Madison Ford, Research Intern
Madison is a Master of Public Health student at Georgia State University. Before coming to GEEARS, Madison served as a Peer Leader at the University of Alabama in Tuscaloosa, where she acted as a liaison between students and professors. Her responsibilities in this position included providing advice, guidance, and feedback to students and providing resources to help first-year students navigate the University. Madison concurrently served as an Assistant Team Leader for one of the University’s mentoring programs, Al’s Pals. She has also served as a Human Resources Intern during her summer breaks at Planned Parenthood, Washington, DC. Madison holds a Bachelor of Science in Public Health with an emphasis in Health Education and Promotion and a minor in Public Policy from the University of Alabama. Madison’s research interests are health equity, access to care, social determinants of health, public health ethics, health promotion, and public policy.

 
Faith Omotor, Program Coordinator Intern
Faith has a Bachelor of Science in Public Health and is currently pursuing an Master of Pubic Health degree concentrating in Health Policy and Management at Georgia State University. Before joining GEEARS, Faith worked as a Youth Coordinator and a Student Health Educator with Grady Hospital. Her goal is to help create and implement impactful programs and transform policy and healthcare systems locally and globally.

Checking in: How Georgia’s Families are Navigating Child Care and Employment Impacts in the Era of COVID-19 

In July 2021, GEEARS: Georgia Early Education Alliance for Ready Students commissioned a statewide survey of 400 Georgia parents with children ages 0-4 that focused on a range of topics, including childcare arrangements and satisfaction levels, general attitudes toward, perceptions of, and preferences for child care, and financial and employment impacts in relation to child care during these unprecedented times.

Host A Virtual Film Screening for Your Parent Group or Organization

GEEARS is excited to partner with community leaders from across Georgia to help facilitate engaging events about young children and their families.

To do this, we're offering technical assistance to communities to put on meaningful, accessible events. GEEARS will help secure a film to virtually screen, host the online platform, and plan and advertise the event.

In the past, communities used films to help spread awareness and serve as a conversation starter for guest speakers from the community. Conversations included elected officials discussing policy opportunities, expert educators sharing tips with parents about how to create learning experiences at home, and more.

If you would like to explore hosting a virtual screening and discussion in your community, fill out the form below and get connected! We'd love to talk with you about it. This is a first-come, first-served opportunity, and we will take on as many events as possible! 

If you have any further questions after filling out the form, please feel free to reach out to gbarrett@geears.org. 

Film Options: 

• Starting at Zero – (1h 3m) Focused on early childhood policy, and includes state agency leaders from Georgia
• Zero Weeks – (1h 27m) A close look at paid family leave, including families with young children
• No Small Matter – (1h 14m) An entertaining introduction to core early childhood topics
• Through the Night – (1h 15m) A portrait of the herculean effort both caregivers and families give to raising young children today

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