With support from the Robert R. McCormick Foundation, a new partnership between early educators and K-12 school districts is emerging.  Resilient Southern Illinois[1], a partnership of southern Illinois school districts, the Southern Illinois Coalition for Children & Families, and Child Care Resource & Referral-JALC are bringing awareness of Adverse Childhood Experiences and trauma-responsive practices to area’s public schools, childcare programs, Head Start programs, and Pre-K programs.  They also hope to better meet the needs of the region’s children by creating coordination and alignment between the early childhood education and K-12 systems.  

The Resilient Early Education Pilot will initially work with three area school districts and their “feeder systems” of childcare, Head Start, and Pre-K centers.  Teams of leaders from these organizations will help develop the actual program which will be based on the same principles as Resilient Southern Illinois:

• Collaboration between labor and management in schools is essential.
• Building leadership capacity and facilitating systems change are foundational to our work.
• Our work must be approached with a racial equity and social justice lens.
• Family and community engagement are central to the success of our efforts.
• Investing in adults is critical to child well-being.

The program features many of the elements of Resilient Southern Illinois’ work with public schools including:

• Building leadership teams;
• Investing in their professional development;
• Shaping ambitious but realistic plans;
• Creating the flexibility needed for schools and early education sites to incorporate these insights into their day to day practices.