MEETING NOTES
San Antonio Literacy Group
Thursday, February 9, 2004, 9:00 a.m.

NOTE: The next meeting of the small Working Group will take place on Thursday, March 18, 2004, at 150 Frank Ogawa Plaza, 4th Floor, at 9:30 a.m.

AGENDA:

1. Introductions
2. Review of January 7, 2004 meeting
3. Review of Data
4. Program Development — themes from last meeting
   • Build on existing efforts, and fulfill requirements of existing programs
   • Help to reach families not in [licensed] care
   • Coordination of all types of child care providers in the area
   • Start with what we can do (in 6-9 months); build to bigger efforts
   • Sustainability
5. Integrate this work into larger San Antonio Initiative
6. Next Steps

DATA :

Mike Cassidy, a planner with the Dept. of Human Services, presented some of the data requested at the previous meeting on January 7, 2004. These data included:

• Population (2000) for ages 0-5, by ZIP Code area (94606 and 94601)
• Age distribution of adults, by ZIP Code area (These two items are also available by Census tract, but were not presented;13 tracts are included in the San Antonio neighborhood).
• Birth data for 2000-2002 for San Antonio, by Census tract.
• CalWORKs: the number of children below age 5 receiving aid, and the number of households with children <5 receiving aid, by Census tract
• Census data re: “Ability to Speak English”, by ZIP Code area. This shows data for Spanish, all other Indo-European languages combined, Asian and Pacific Island languages combined, and for all other languages spoken in Oakland (e.g., Basque, Hungarian, Turkish, Finnish)
• Population in early childhood education programs (Head Start and OUSD) and in licensed child care (centers and family child care homes).

Rory Darrah of “First Five” also presented partial data about home visits. (Data was not available from all entities which do visiting.)

FIVE PRIMARY MODELS :

Ms. Andrea Youngdahl, led a discussion about possible goals and models for accomplishing the literacy mission in Lower San Antonio . Suggestions included:

1. Parent & Provider leadership for families with young children
   [this model is not in existence in San Antonio .]
2. Working w/ licensed providers to build program capacity & quality (on the way to existence in San Antonio)
3. Working w/ community groups to support families w/ kids not in licensed care (exists in East Oakland, but not San Antonio)
4. Coordinated set of family literacy and parent literacy (some exists, but not program-specific). Examples include field trips, family literacy programs, etc.
5. Expanded home visiting
   • Which kids?
   • What kind of home visiting [e.g.,professional vs.paraprofessional visitors]

SOME PROPOSED GOALS FOR LITERACY IN LOWER SAN ANTONIO:

1. Improve communication among agencies serving parents of young children.
2. Promote greater leadership among parents with young children, and their capacity to work in partnership w/ those agencies who serve them.
3. Longer-term goal to identify service gaps, then address these gaps.

STRATEGIES FOR PARENT ENGAGEMENT :

• What is “Parent Leadership”?
  • Empowerment; based on strengths
  • Provide support; respond to needs (e.g., not able to access resources)
  • Home ownership: Parents are interested in this.
• Economic Success — Survey, etc.
  Urban Strategies is currently undertaking a survey (for a different project) which could also have a direct bearing on this project.
  • Add another (or several?) sampling criteria (e.g., younger parents, parents of younger children)
• Interest is not solely on economic success issues (e.g., home ownership).
• Immigration information: International Institute.
• School-readiness kits
• Transition to kindergarten
• Visits by kindergarten teachers
• Head Start transition process
• Hawthorne School
• Franklin School
• Problem: High family mobility
• Contract with kindergarten teachers to do workshops for parents.
• Youth and parents as mentors
• Lower San Antonio Collaborative (existing)
  • So far, more focused on K-12 than on 0-5. Casey Foundation Framework emphasizes 0-5, so this is a gap for the Initiative.
  • Casey Foundation view vs. view of Collaborative; these may diverge
  • Resident engagement/involvement
    Do RESIDENTS drive the agenda? Cadre of parents for this work? (Could come from existing programs, e.g., Even Start & H/S center committees, etc. ) “Parent Voices”
  • Agendas may differ: e.g., parents, CBOs, Foundation
• FCC providers have dual role: they are also residents, and often parents
• CBET ESL programs: Possible focus groups

OUTLINE OF POTENTIAL ACTIVITIES:

• Some event to bring all child care providers in San Antonio together: E.g., bring providers together (as an organizing tool?) to do Adult Literacy in common.
• “Inventory” of literacy resources
• How to build on each other’s efforts
• Plan some definite number of events for families
• Possible EBAYC involvement w/ young parents (they already serve some in their youth programs?)
• How Even Start can help EBAYC reach out to parents of children 0-5?
  • Does EBAYC have the capacity and interest to take on a new effort?
  • Which staff person(s) can be identified?
  • Is the intent organizing or outreach & information?
  • EBAYC uses a “power and leadership” model versus information and referral.
• Urban Strategies Council can map existing childcare sites, etc.
  • also interested in existing administrative data sets which might be relevant.
• Merge mini-grants (direct to parents) w/ process for determining which activities to do? (Parent leadership)
  • Challenges: e.g., differing languages, cultures, expectations.
• How to build AGENCY capacity (of all partners), so that the effort will continue when dedicated funding ends?

NEXT STEPS:

1. Compile meeting notes
2. Draft a Concept Paper as starting point
   • Smaller work group to meet, propose activities to larger group (Kerry F., Jenny M., Rory D., Tracey B., Jane N., Sara B., Andrea Y., Mike C)
   • Seek EBAYC participation (Jane Nicholson to follow up)
   • Use today’s discussion as basis for a “skeleton” or outline
3. Present the outline/concept paper to the full group
4. Meet with Moira Kinney from San Francisco First Five re: success of mini-grants.