The Administration for Children and Families (ACF) announces the availability of $6,161,948 to be competitively awarded for the purpose of expanding access to high-quality, comprehensive services to low-income infants and toddlers and their families through Early Head Start-Child Care (EHS-CC) Partnerships, or through the expansion of Early Head Start services.
Donor Name: Administration for Children and Families
State: New York
County: Bronx County (NY), Kings County (NY)
City: Brooklyn
Type of Grant: Grant
Deadline: 01/26/2024
Size of the Grant: More than $1 million
Grant Duration: 5 Years
Details:
The Head Start and EHS programs provide grants to public and private non-profit and for-profit agencies to provide comprehensive child development services to predominately economically disadvantaged children and families. Head Start’s primary purpose is to prepare children to be ready for school and ensure their healthy development. In fiscal year (FY) 1995, the EHS program was established to serve pregnant women and children from birth to 3 years of age in recognition of the mounting evidence that the earliest years matter a great deal to children’s growth and development. Since its beginning in 1965, Head Start has served more than 35 million children and their families. In FY 2022 Head Start was funded to serve 833,075 children and families and of these, 197,455 were funded in the EHS program. These programs were operated by 1,560 Head Start recipients, including 1,137 recipients providing EHS program services for infants, toddlers, and pregnant women.
The following list provides a brief summary of the EHS services to be provided to the children and families through this grant:
- Eligibility, recruitment, selection, enrollment, and attendance, ensuring the most vulnerable children are served.
- Comprehensive early childhood education and development services that promote the physical, social, emotional, cognitive, and language development of young children and families during the early years through the following:
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- EHS group sizes and teacher/caregiver to child ratios;
- Qualified and trained staff to ensure warm and continuous relationships between caregivers, children, and families that are crucial to learning and development for infants and toddlers;
- Parent involvement in their children’s learning and development;
- Provision of learning opportunities for infants and toddlers to grow and develop in warm, nurturing, and inclusive environments;
- Culturally and linguistically responsive services that support continuity of care between the home environment of the child and the program;
- Health and safety of enrolled children;
- Health promotion by providing comprehensive health, mental health, and oral health services for children, and helping families to identify and access a medicalhome to ensure ongoing care;
- Nutrition, including participation in the Child and Adult Care Food Program, arrangements for nursing mothers who choose to breastfeed, and provision of formula in center-based programs and family child care homes;
- Inclusion of at-risk children with disabilities by ensuring the following:
- Services meet the needs of children with disabilities and their families, including the establishment and implementation of procedures to identify such children and plans to coordinate with programs providing services;
- Children with documented behavioral problems receive appropriate screening and referral;
- An inclusive, supportive environment where children with disabilities can be served in the same settings as typically developing children; and
- That 10 percent of the children enrolled have a disability, unless granted a waiver by OHS.
- Family partnerships providing services to parents that engage in the following ways:
- Support their role as parents;
- Promote positive parent-child interactions, including the participation of fathers; and
- Enable families to move toward self-sufficiency.
- Community partnerships by ensuring formal linkages and coordination with community agencies located in the area or state that provide services within the birth-to-5 continuum of care and education to ensure that children receive continuous, coordinated services from birth to school entry. Coordination should include such providers as early intervention service providers; other agencies providing services to infants and toddlers, including the Maternal, Infant, and Early Childhood Home Visiting Program and other home visiting programs; local Head Start programs; state pre-kindergarten; and other local providers of early childhood education.
- Administrative and financial management, including the following:
- Ensuring a well-functioning governing body to share responsibility for oversight of the delivery of high-quality services;
- Ensuring financial management systems are in place that meet requirements set forth in 45 CFR § 75.302;
- Ensuring family involvement in the program through opportunities such as participation in the policy council or committees at the recipient-level;
- Ensuring that the level of services provided to families responds to their specific needs and circumstances;
- Recruiting, training, and supervising high-quality staff;
- Providing professional development plans for each staff member to ensure that each staff person attains and maintains qualifications for his/her position and meets all Head Start requirements for staff working with infants and toddlers (Head Start Act 42 U.S.C. 9840a(h)(2)); and
- Implementing a systematic procedure for transitioning children, such as the following:
- Ensuring continuity of services and smooth transitions when the needs of families change, to ensure that children served through the EHS-CC Partnership receive ongoing services through fluctuations of family status;
- Supporting transition planning with families to ensure each pregnant woman and child experiences smooth transitions into EHS and child care services, and from EHS and child care services to Head Start or other preschool programs.
- Implementing appropriate financial management systems so that expenditures are attributable to specific activities under the grant award.
- Transportation by working with families to address their transportation needs and providing or helping them find transportation, as needed to participate in the program.
- Facilities by ensuring centers and family child care homes meet licensing and all health and safety requirements for infants and toddlers.
Funding Information
- Estimated Total Program Funding: $ 6,161,948
- Award Ceiling: $6,161,948
- Award Floor: $1,000,000
Grant Period
60-month project period with five 12-month budget periods.
Eligibility Criteria
- Native American tribal governments (Federally recognized)
- Public housing authorities/Indian housing authorities
- For profit organizations other than small businesses
- Private institutions of higher education
- Public and State controlled institutions of higher education
- Nonprofits that do not have a 501(c)(3) status with the IRS, other than institutions of higher education
- State governments
- Nonprofits having a 501(c)(3) status with the IRS, other than institutions of higher education
- City or township governments
- Small businesses
- County governments
- Independent school districts
For more information, visit Grants.gov.
