Leading with Equity

Best Starts for Kids

Leading with Equity Key Learnings from Best Starts for Kids Partners July 2021

Key learnings from Best Starts for Kids Partners By listening to what Best Starts partners have shared with us at Cardea about program implementation and backed by evaluation data, we’ve identified five key themes critical to Best Starts partners, spanning all strategies.

1. Leading with Equity

5. Working to Transform Policies, Systems, & Environments

2. Centering Culture & Language

5 Evaluation Themes 4. Building Organizational & Community Strength

3. Supporting Communities that Thrive

In this case study series, we share stories and data from Best Starts partners that highlight these five themes.

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Cardea analyzed stories and data shared by Best Starts for Kids partners Earlier this year, Best Starts for Kids asked Cardea to develop this series of case studies to document key learnings from across the Best Starts for Kids initiative. Best Starts grounds its work in community knowledge as well as science and research in an effort to continually reflect community needs and deepen the initiative’s impact. To support this effort, Best Starts partners regularly share stories about their work along with data, including information about who participates in Best Starts programming. Best Starts analyzes these data and stories each year to share learnings back with their partners, their communities, and the residents of King County through community conversations, publications, and the Best Starts for Kids data dashboard.

This case study series features data and stories that have been shared with Best Starts since the initiative launched.

Cardea also partnered with local artist, Michael B. Maine, to capture Best Starts partners in their own words. Nine partner organizations also participated in conversations this spring so we could better represent their work related to the case study themes. Although so many Best Starts partners could be highlighted in this series, these nine organizations were selected because the stories they had previously shared with Best Starts were particularly wellaligned with the themes.

Organizations supported through Best Starts for Kids center communities to advance equity Partner organizations that center equity as a core component of their organizational values and service delivery are more impactfully supporting children, youth, and families who participate in programming.

Best Starts partners collaborate closely with families and communities to ensure services are meeting the needs of those with the greatest disparities in positive health and wellness outcomes.

Organizations use outcomes data and demographic information to monitor and ensure that services eliminate barriers and are reaching those most in need and creating equitable outcomes.

The most impactful organizations are grounded in equity throughout all areas of programming from organizational culture and staffing, to balancing evidence-based program models with cultural/community responsiveness.

For more information about Best Starts for Kids please visit the 2020 Annual Report and Implementation Plan.

About Best Starts for Kids

Best Starts for Kids

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Best Starts for Kids

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What we found

With support from Best Starts, partners have implemented programming that elevates the power of the communities they work within to overcome barriers so that everyone can thrive.​

Organizations supported through Best Starts for Kids center communities to advance equity within workforce and programming, and ultimately benefit the children, youth, and families participating in services Best Starts for Kids 7

Technical assistance support in the funding process helped community-based organizations build or restore trust in King County and its commitment to equity

Best Starts recognized that many organizations have historically experienced barriers accessing funding opportunities from government agencies such as King County. To address this, Best Starts provided free technical assistance to organizations applying for funds, with the goal to eliminate the linguistic, cultural, and procedural barriers that might prevent qualified organizations from seeking government funding.

24%

Of organizations that received technical assistance on at least one successful application had never applied for King County funding before

To see more about technical assistance for Best Starts funding applicants, check out this blog post What we found

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Best Starts supports equitable access to resources

We understood that big organizations were getting funded and that stopped us from pursuing [county funding]. It’s a lot of time to put into an application and seeing the pattern of grassroots organizations not getting funding, it really turned us off... The biggest fear is accessing the government system and how things work…[The technical assistance provider] would encourage us to apply, always say we are doing the work, and the government funds, why not give it a try.

Best Starts Partner

First Time Applicant for King County Funding

What we found

The Best Starts Workforce Development Strategy sought to integrate equity into training and certifications with increased accessibility and updated content and curriculum Workforce Development programs seek to set up a coordinated system of professional development for King County’s prenatal-to-five workforce. These programs serve to enhance providers’ knowledge, attitudes, and skills in Best Starts priority areas (equity, healthy child development) and build providers’ sense of self-efficacy, well-being, and reflective capacity.

Workforce Development Strategy Equity Impact 2020

Interpretation and translation increased accessibility, as well as having trainers who are representative of more communities.

90% reported the training considered equity related to participants diverse needs and experience.

Curriculum and content were reviewed and updated to include more equity material.

88% reported an increase in knowledge related to equity as a result of training.

To see more data on all Best Starts for Kids strategies, check out the data dashboard What we found

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Best Starts for Kids

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For Best Starts partners, creating an organizational culture of equity is the heart of meaningful and impactful services for children, youth, and families Best Starts for Kids partners shared information about how they center equity as a foundational element of successful services. A wide variety of partners identified ways in which centering equity leads to greater impact for children, youth, and families. For example, partners frequently design services for families with children identifying as Black, Indigenous, and people of color (BIPOC) to reduce disparities in health outcomes.

74%

of children, youth, and families served by Best Starts for Kids programs throughout King County, identified as Black, Indigenous, and people of color (BIPOC) in 2020.

To see more data on all Best Starts for Kids strategies, check out the data dashboard What we found

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Best Starts partners consistently reported a direct relationship between their commitment to equity and community engagement strategies and activities

Community-led outreach activities increased direct engagement with organizations creating opportunities to better understand specific community service needs.

Organizations that center equity regularly adapt programming and services based on continuous feedback to remove barriers to services for children and families.

Pairing community engagement with youth-led activities provides leadership opportunities for youth and more meaningful ways for communities to connect with organizations’ work.

Community input about the greater need for equitable access to services and resources often leads to organizations expanding their services to more geographic areas, new languages, and more.

To see more data on all Best Starts for Kids strategies, check out the data dashboard What we found

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Best Starts’ Evidence-Based and Evidence-Informed HomeBased programs centered family voices to refer and connect caregivers of young kids to resources and services that meets their unique needs

The home-based programs in this strategy are built on recognized evidence-based or evidence-supported interventions. To qualify for this opportunity, programs needed to meet criteria based on well-defined models that have been documented as producing positive outcomes.

Best Starts home-based program partners served an increasing number of families from 2018 through 2020 with 64% of families successfully referred and/or connected to additional services over all three years.

1000 826

800 600 472

400 200

287

0 2018

2019

2020

To see more data on the Evidence-Based and Evidence-Informed strategy, check out the data dashboard What we found

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Many Best Starts partners are leading with equity in a variety of ways to create change that provides services with greater impact on reducing disparities among BIPOC, immigrant and refugee, low-income, and LGBTQIA communities Centering equity to intentionally design systems means centering participants, staff, and leaders who are experiencing challenges with those systems such as BIPOC, immigrant and refugee, low-income, or LGBTQIA communities.

Equity is attainable with strong and persistent advocacy for children, youth, and families integrated into organizational programming.

Organizations are creating new spaces or ways to be more inclusive to expand access to programs that feel safe and supportive to children, youth, and families.

Best Starts for Kids

To see more data on all Best Starts for Kids strategies, check out the data dashboard What we found

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Partners report that equity drives how programs and services are tailored toward youth and young adults (5 to 24 years) through reflective staff representation, grounding services in cultural identities, and diving deep into outcomes data The Community Empowered Disposition Alternative and Resolution (CEDAR) program of the Stopping the Schoolto-Prison Pipeline strategy, diverts young people from the legal system and connects them to community-based programs that care for their development and wellbeing while working to reduce or dismiss their charges. CEDAR exemplifies how community programs that are rooted in equity and center the experiences of young people most impacted by systemic and institutional racism will best support their success and growth.

Percent of youth/young adults receive a lower sentencing recommendation upon exiting the program in 2020 75%

100%

96%

100%

60%

71%

69%

67%

68%

Overall – 67% 43%

50% 25% 0% 12-14

15-17

16-24

Female

Male

Black/African American

White

Unknown/missing

To see more data on the CEDAR strategy, check out the data dashboard What we found

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Best Starts Partners lead with equity Our community and our recruitment ensure representative leadership: staff, volunteers, mentors and board reflect young women’s diverse backgrounds. In 2018, our board approved a new strategic plan which outlines our strong commitment to equity and inclusion. In crafting policies, procedures, and programs, we center communities of girls and women who often lack access to leadership and mentorship programs. For us this means centering youth participants, mentors, staff, and organizational leaders who are people of color; from immigrant communities; from low-income backgrounds; and those who identify as LGBTQIA. Youth and adults from these communities identify barriers related to program location and other factors and we mobilize resources and strategize to address those barriers.

Best Starts Partner Sustaining the Gain

What we found

Stories of Impact

Best Starts partner organizations embrace equitable approaches in all aspects of their work. From staffing practices and support, to integrating community-voice into services, Best Starts partners are leading with equity. Partner organizations also recognize Bests Start’s commitment to equity has had an impact on strengthening the finance, training, and capacity support provided through Best Starts for Kids.

Stories from Best Starts for Kids Partners: ▪ ▪

Atlantic Street Center El Centro de la Raza

Best Starts for Kids partners, Atlantic Street Center and El Centro de la Raza, have engrained equity within staffing, programming, and community work for children and families to embrace their value and power Atlantic Street Center and El Centro de la Raza provide rich, specific examples of the larger impact of leading with equity in their community. Reviewing data and information provided by all Best Starts partners, Cardea highlights these two organizations as examples representing the ways in which so many Best Starts for Kids partners center equity-driven community services to achieve greater impact for children and families.

Best Starts for Kids

Stories of impact

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Best Starts partner, Atlantic Street Center, strives for equity in the community to best serve youth and families Best Starts for Kids

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Atlantic Street Center centers equity throughout programming by using a strengths-based approach to encourage transformation of families and communities Atlantic Street Center (ASC) was founded in 1918 and for over 30 years, ASC has focused on a holistic, family-centered approach to meet families where they are, remove barriers, and provide resources to early learning, healthy youth development, behavioral health, and domestic violence services.

ASC knows that families and communities are the experts in identifying needs and continuously sees how wisdom, adaptation, and fearlessness present in the community leads to greater resilience of families. ASC seeks to elevate these strengths with families by forming deep partnerships that strengthen staff’s ability to provide services that best meet the needs of children and families in the community.

Best Starts for Kids

In partnership with Best Starts for Kids, ASC increased capacity and sustainability for foundational programs and implemented new, high-quality services such as homelessness prevention, which fully embrace the holistic approach to family support.

Stories of impact

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Atlantic Street Center staff come from the community and share culture and lived experiences which leads to stronger trust and ability to listen to and meet individual needs To truly lead with equity, ASC hires staff who represent the communities participating in services. Knowing that staffing should reflect the community is one way ASC is able to deeply connect and partner with youth who come to the Center.

Representation is both situational as well as cultural. Michelle, ASC Program Manager, was a young mother who experienced homelessness, and navigated the foster care system and kinship care (informal care by a non-legal guardian). She knows those experiences help her deeply connect to the experiences of youth and young parents coming through the door, but she also knows because of that experience, she needs to lean in and ask those youth what ASC can do to truly be helpful.

By continuously asking and committing to partnership, ASC sees young parents who are experiencing homelessness transition to being employed, able to support their families, able to care for themselves as parents, and better care for their children.

Stories of impact

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We are not saving them, they're saving themselves. We're not empowering them; we're enabling them to unlock their own power. They have it, they possess it, they just need to know it…We're just showing them how to unlock it or we're showing them how to ignite it!

Michelle Mitchell-Brannon Atlantic Street Center Investing Early, Sustaining the Gain

Stories of impact

Leading with equity means intentional programming supports young people in transforming into current and future leaders of Atlantic Street Center, communities, and society ASC understands that leading with equity means programming is intentional.

Intentional youth programming includes cultural responsiveness, co-planning activities with youth, and embracing equity in staffing practices. Transforming into leaders does not happen overnight, however through intentional activities, ASC has seen kids fully grow into their leadership potential as their confidence begins to soar.

ASC has so many stories of youth who step into leadership roles when they have more confidence in their self-image and self-power. When young people develop confidence, they often actively begin to seek out peer leadership roles or opportunities to be a voice for youth within their communities.

By embedding equity and centering the agency of young people, ASC has seen youth and young people transform into thriving young adults who: • • •

Have the resources needed to be present and engaged.

Become leaders in the community and in the ASC organization.

Gain confidence to embrace their strengths and abilities.

Stories of impact

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In order to lead with equity, we have to have intentional programming that produces impact…so being culturally relevant, making sure that we're celebrating [diverse cultures]… making sure that we're having folks that look like [participants] to support them…We're also leaning in. It's important to ask what is it that you'd like us to do? [And] we include them in that way.

Michelle Mitchell-Brannon Atlantic Street Center Investing Early, Sustaining the Gain

Stories of impact

Intentional programming and centering community gives staff the ability to quickly adapt and respond to shifting needs of children, youth, and families By grounding equity work with intentional programming and community-voice, ASC has a moment-to-moment understanding of community needs. The COVID19 pandemic has disproportionately impacted communities of color through higher case counts, death rates, and socioeconomic losses due to longstanding inequities and systemic racism. Building upon their strong relationships, ASC saw they needed to quickly pivot existing program structures to meet the new arising needs of families. During the COVID-19 pandemic, ASC worked hard to ensure equitable access to the resources families needed to shelter-in-place and continuing working and supporting their children by:

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Removing digital barriers to school, tutoring, and engagement activities for youth with laptops and resources for Wi-Fi and bandwidth that could handle a range of online activities to ensure children did not fall behind in school.

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Ramping up meal support and food access for families who had been impacted by layoffs and reduced work hours related to the pandemic.

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Partnering with Best Starts for financial support to distribute masks, hand sanitizers, and cleaning products so families could keep their homes safe for children while continuing to work.

Stories of impact

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In their own words…

Atlantic Street Center

Stories of impact

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Best Starts partner El Centro de la Raza centers equity in their organization and programs and the impact is felt throughout the community

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El Centro de la Raza has a deep commitment to uplifting the community, treating people with respect and dignity, and designing programs to eliminate inequities within the systems where they work El Centro de la Raza (El Centro– The Center for People of All Races) is a voice and a hub for the Latino community of Washington and provides 43 programs and services for lowincome children, youth, families, and seniors of all backgrounds. With support from Best Starts for Kids, El Centro has added valuable resources throughout the spectrum of services such mental health access for children, expanded home-visiting support, and professional development opportunities for staff.

Best Starts for Kids

Stories of impact

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As an organization grounded in the Latino community of Washington State, it is the mission of El Centro de la Raza (The Center for People of All Races) to build the Beloved Community through unifying all racial and economic sectors; to organize, empower, and defend the basic human rights of our most vulnerable and marginalized populations; and to bring critical consciousness, justice, dignity, and equity to all the peoples of the world.

Maria del Rocio Miranda El Centro de la Raza Investing Early

Stories of impact

El Centro de la Raza advances equitable early childhood development by pairing their unique approaches with a national evidence-based program model When families arrive at the El Centro community center, they know they will be treated with respect and valued as members of the community. When awarded Best Starts for Kids funding to implement the national ParentChild+ home visiting program, El Centro paired their staffing approach of ensuring cultural and language access with the evidence-based national model. Families partner with a community-based home-visitor to build trusting relationships that boost parents’ self-confidence and self-sufficiency as an expert in their child’s development.

Home visitors act as a facilitators, coaches, and cheerleaders. As a result, El Centro is seeing success with children scoring higher on emotional skills, increasing their educational attainment, and receiving timely supports for developmental issues arising during screening.

Stories of impact

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El Centro provides children and families with greater continuity of services as a result of equitable investments in staff wellness and retention As an organization, El Centro works hard to embed equitable staffing practices into organizational culture to address challenges with burnout and staff turnover. In addition to hiring community members as program staff, opportunities through Best Starts for Kids has enabled El Centro to:

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Have staff participate in certification trainings to advance their skillset and bring services to home-visiting such as infant-mental health and trauma-informed practice.

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Access expanded resource networks and new partnership opportunities for greater home visitor peer support and tool sharing. For example, El Centro developed a formal collaboration with Perinatal Support of Washington for home visitor training and provides direct referrals to PSW Resilience Specialist and Mental Health Services Navigator Programs.

Stories of impact

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Mindfulness programming for staff and participants supports their physical and emotional well-being to best serve the community The El Centro team knows that mindfulness practice can help manage stress, trauma, and promote equitable well-being. El Centro collaborated with partners to implement mindfulness programs for staff and participants.

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Through the Best Starts Workforce Collaborative, El Centro provides workshops for staff to incorporate mindfulness with their reflective practices, which supports culturally-relevant, radical healing.

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El Centro collaborated with Odessa Brown Children’s Clinic, Seattle Children’s Hospital, and the University of Washington Center for Child and Family Well-Being to train staff and provide mindfulness workshops and meditations to program participants.

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Best Starts for Kids

Through a partnership with the SEACAP-L Research Project, El Centro developed a culturally appropriate parenting tool with meditation techniques for program participants.

Stories of impact

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The trainings [Best Starts] has been providing have been invaluable, especially for the home visitors. Home visitors are given the opportunity to grow and get endorsements via [Best Starts], especially considering it’s not easy to get those endorsements. We are making sure that our home visitors get as much support as they need and that’s not possible without [Best Starts].

Hayley Berra

El Centro de la Raza Investing Early

Stories of impact

When Best Starts leads with equity, trainings, funding, and resources provided to partner organizations are more impactful for children, youth, and families El Centro shared the benefits seen through Best Starts' equity-driven approach to trainings, funding, and flexibility and finds that this approach complements El Centro’s commitment to equity.

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El Centro home visitors noted that trainings put on by Best Starts were the first they had attended with a person of color as the expert and trainer and materials and trainings provided in multiple languages.

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Due to Best Starts commitment to equitable funding, El Centro was able complete a pay equity assessment for the home-visitor program to increase staff salaries to a level that better reflects and values staffs’ continued hard work. Supporting staff leads to lower staff burnout and turnover meaning higher quality support and continuity for families.

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Best Starts for Kids

El Centro has also increased the safety and accessibility of resources provided to families by being able to afford higher quality products (for example: wooden toys instead of BPA-containing plastics; translated versions of books).

Stories of impact

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Contributors:

Thank you

Atlantic Street Center

El Centro de la Raza

Michelle Mitchell-Brannon

Hayley Berra

Director of Youth and Education ParentChild+ Supervisor Support

Diesha Rodgers Director of Early Learning

Maria del Rocio Miranda

Early Learning Home Visiting Director

Iris Navarro

Bebes!BSK Supervisor and Home Visitor

Cardea is a national, women of color-led organization, based in Seattle. We envision a world in which optimal health and wellbeing, equity, and justice are realities for all communities. For 50 years, we have been committed to addressing complex program, policy, and systems issues by cocreating solutions that center community strengths and wisdom.

Authors & Contributors MJ Coppock Avanthi Jayasuriya Kelsey Liu Olivia Lutz

Elizabeth Menstell Wendy Nakatsukasa-Ono Erica Wei Wu Amanda Winters

Michael B. Maine uses photography, video, and audio to work with people to find, develop, and share their stories. Rather than Michael telling their story, he provides a platform for a person to tell their own. With this process, he hopes to create pieces that are authentic, unique, and beautiful.

Organizations supported through Best Starts for Kids center communities to advance equity

Best Starts for Kids

This work is made possible by Best Starts for Kids. Best Starts for Kids strengthens families and communities so that babies are born healthy, children thrive and establish a strong foundation for life, and young people grow into happy, healthy adults. Learn more at kingcounty.gov/BestStarts.