ALIGN Huddle Topics

NEXT Memphis is a child care shared services initiative operated by the Memphis nonprofit Porter Leath. It supports child care programs through comprehensive resources to improve quality and business success. 

• Business Support: Business development, back-office advising and management, human resources consulting, facility repairs, marketing to boost enrollment, and IT consulting. 
• Classroom Resources: Instructional coaching and training for teachers, including training on assessments and curriculum. 
• Family Supports: Wraparound support services for families in participating child care programs. 

Points of Pride:  

• Since launching in 2020, the initiative is supporting 32 child care centers and family day homes with 1895 children.  
• Business supports resulted in 91% of programs reported saving money, 19.8% decrease in cost per child, 14% enrollment increase.  
• Classroom supports resulted in 92% of students assessed have met developmental benchmarks, 66% of 4-year olds assessed increased in i-station scores;  
• Family supports resulted in more than 550 family outcome assessments completed. escription

 Community Schools are public schools that partner with local organizations to provide services and support that are tailored to community needs. In Memphis, Seeding Success has spearheaded an initiative to launch xx community schools in partnership with the Memphis Shelby County School District to support students and families holistically.

• Community Integration: Engages families and community resources to create a supportive school environment.
• School and Community Partnerships: Connects schools with local resources to address academic, social, and emotional needs 

Points of Pride:

• Coming soon

Coming Soon…

Healthy Families TN/Parents As Teachers is an evidence-based home visiting program managed by West TN Healthcare. It supports children from prenatal stages to age five and their primary caregivers across multiple counties in West Tennessee. Since its launch in 1997, the program has been instrumental in promoting safe sleep practices, increasing infant immunization rates, and enhancing child well-being throughout West Tennessee. 

• Health Support: Provides guidance on immunizations, mental health, nutrition, and physical and mental development for children, supports caregivers’ mental and physical health, and provides resources for extended family members. 
• Parent-Child Interaction: Strengthens the bond between caregivers and children through structured games and interactive play. 
• Community Resources: Offers assistance with housing, food access, education, transportation, and child care options and connects families to community referrals for comprehensive household support. 

 Parents as Teachers is a prenatal through kindergarten home visiting program that promotes healthy development, school readiness, and family well-being. The Knox County Health Department has administered a Parents as Teachers program since xxxx that supports xx number of families. It aims to support parents as their child’s first educators, ensuring children are healthy, safe, and prepared to learn. Services include:

• Personal Visits: Regular home visits to educate parents on early childhood development.
• Group Meetings: Sessions for parents to share experiences and learn from each other.
• Child Screenings: Early detection of developmental delays and health issues.
• Resource Network: Access to various resources to foster school readiness and reduce child abuse.

Points of Pride:

• First, our affiliate received the prestigious blue ribbon from PAT National. This is a very big honor and achievement! For a typical affiliate with parents as teachers you are required to meet 21 essential requirements each year to remain in good standing with the national center.
  • Affiliates who are awarded the blue ribbon have met not only the 21 essential requirements but also have met 80%of the 81 standards set forth by Parents as Teachers national. That is 64 out of 81 standards that must be met to achieve the blue ribbon and IT’S NOT EASY!!!
  • The process to determine a blue ribbon is called the quality endorsement improvement process and is completed every five to six years. It is a rigorous process where there is a deep dive into the affiliate. The process itself takes about a year and a half. 
• Second, our parent educators were trained in infant massage over the summer and are all working on earning their certification in infant massage and will be offering this to all interested and eligible PAT families.

Le Bonheur on the Move (LOM) is a mobile medical unit by Le Bonheur Community Outreach that provides essential healthcare to children in underserved areas of rural West Tennessee. 

• Well-Child Examinations: Comprehensive checkups to monitor child health and development. 
• Acute Care: Immediate medical care for illnesses and injuries. 
• Sports Physicals: Physical assessments to clear students for sports participation. 
• Developmental and Behavioral Assessments: Evaluations to support behavioral and developmental needs. 
• Social and Behavioral Health Services: Guidance on social and emotional well-being. 
• Health Education: Education on maintaining healthy lifestyles. 

Pathways by Porter-Leath is an Early Childhood Educator Apprenticeship Program launched in 2024 to address Tennessee’s child care workforce shortage by providing hands-on training and professional development. 

• Apprenticeship Training: A year-long program combining practical experience with experienced educators’ mentorship. 
• Certification: Upon completion, participants earn a Child Development Associate (CDA) and Early Childhood Educator Certificate. 
• Workforce Development: Prepares skilled early childhood educators to address the quality and availability of child care in Memphis. 

Project On-Track is a high-dosage tutoring program by the Niswonger Foundation. It provides targeted academic support to Tennessee students through small-group tutoring sessions. 

•  High-Frequency Tutoring: At least two 30-minute sessions weekly for a minimum of 12 weeks per semester. 
• Small Tutor-to-Student Ratios: 1:3 for grades 1-5 and 1:4 for grades 6-8. 
• Well-Trained Tutors: Tutors are trained in literacy, math, and trauma-informed care. 
• High-Quality Instructional Materials: Utilizes research-based materials aligned with learning standards. 
• Data-Driven Instruction: Tailors tutoring to individual student needs through data analysis. 

TECTA High School Partnerships with DSCC offer West Tennessee high school students early childhood education credentials, certifications, and college credits free of charge.  This innovative partnership helps students achieve their CDA credential by high school graduation, so they are prepared to enter the early childhood workforce directly after high school and/or to continue in post-secondary education. This recent case study gives a short synopsis of how it works.  Highlights include: 

•  TECTA Orientation Online: Typically during freshman or sophomore year, students participate in 10 three-hour early childhood training modules covering topics such as developmentally appropriate practice. 
• Career and Technical Education Courses:  Next, typically during their junior and senior years, students enroll in Early Childhood Education Careers (ECCE) or Teaching as a Profession (TAP) (or other human services related CTE track) while also being dual enrolled at DSCC for 4 online courses (12 college credit hours).   
• Practicum/Work-based Learning (WBL):  As part of the high school CTE requirement (both ECCE and TAP tracks), a practicum/work-based learning (WBL) is completed. It is typically conducted at a child care or preschool facility offsite where students work on weekends, summers and/or after-school, or in some cases during the school day.  

Point of Pride: The number of participating area high school is now at 30!

LENA Grow is a professional development program designed to enhance early language and literacy by improving language environments.  The program utilizes a talk pedometer that children wear to measure their language environment. LENA software then processes the audio and produces data and reports that can be used to identify and target specific classroom strategies to help students.  Since 2022, Tennessee’s Child Care Resource & Referral (CCR&R) has offered the program statewide to Tennessee’s home and center-based child care settings.  

Educators can engage in LENA Grow through several pathways: 

• As a participant in CCR&R specialization programs. 
• Through a practice-based coaching plan with a CCR&R Coach. 
• As part of the upcoming New Educator Academy. 

Points of Pride:   

• Since launch, LENA Grow in TN has reached 3,197 children.  

Child Care Hub Partnership is a shared services initiative by St. Mary Villa, supported by the Nashville Early Education Coalition, to expand quality childcare access in Nashville/Davidson County through a centralized hub model. With a $1.93 million grant from the Tennessee Department of Human Services, the Child Care Hub Partnership is committed to creating sustainable, accessible, high-quality childcare options for families across Nashville. 

• Quality Improvement: Offers centralized support for curriculum and staff development, allowing childcare providers to focus on nurturing children while ensuring high standards in early education. 
• Increased Access: Addresses Nashville’s growing need for childcare by identifying and supporting new sites for child care programs. 
• Business Proficiency: Streamlines administrative functions such as HR, marketing, accounting, and curriculum management, enhancing the operational efficiency of multiple childcare locations through a central hub. 

Points of Pride:  

• In September celebrated an innovative partnership to establish a child care center at Renewal House, a nonprofit dedicated to substance use treatment for women and their children. 

Pre-K For All Initiative by First 8 Memphis seeks to provide tuition-free, high-quality Pre-K education across Memphis and Shelby County, targeting 75% enrollment for all 3- and 4-year-olds in the county. Since its 2019 launch, First 8 Memphis has served as the fiscal agent and support hub for what has now grown to 80 classrooms (1600 seats) funded by the City of Memphis and Shelby County governments. 

• Core Services: Offers direct support to Pre-K operators, including funding for classroom operations, instructional coaching, and family partnership services that support both children and their caregivers.
• Funding & Accessibility: Advocates to ensure Pre-K programs are both accessible and high-quality, and supports comprehensive services like developmental assessments and school readiness resources.
• Pre-K Partner Alignment: Brings together Pre-K providers from public, charter, and private sectors to unify best practices, increase family access to early education, and identify shared advocacy needs.

Points of Pride

• Coming Soon

Niswonger Foundation School Readiness Initiative is a collaborative effort involving 17 Northeast Tennessee school districts to establish a cohesive approach to school readiness assessment and improvement. 

• School Readiness Definition: Developed a standardized definition of school readiness for educators, caregivers, and the community. 
• Common School Readiness Screener: Selected a unified screening tool for consistent assessment across districts, with a detailed budget for purchasing and administering the screener. 
• Data Sharing and Utilization: Established best practices for administering the screener, sharing data with parents, teachers, and community stakeholders, and using the results to gauge community health. 
• Workgroup Collaboration: A representative workgroup from each district meets quarterly to oversee the implementation and progress of the initiative. 

Points of Pride: 

• Supported by a Ballad Health Community Health Improvement grant, the initiative screened approximately 5,000 students as of September 2024, providing valuable data to guide early childhood support across the region. 

Ballad Healthcare Center for Early Learning is an employer-led child care initiative created to respond to the significant challenges of finding and affording childcare faced by families in the Northeast Tennessee and Southwest Virginia region that Ballad Health serves.  Ballad Health authorized a sizable upfront capital investment as well as an ongoing investment to subsidize its childcare services.   

• Ballad Health authorized a sizable upfront capital investment as well as an ongoing investment to subsidize its childcare services. 
• Ballad provides its team members a substantial discount to make childcare more affordable to them.  
• Ballad partners with Head Start and local school systems to provide integrated learning experiences for children within these programs. 
• Ballad partners with high school CTE classes and higher education programs to offer field experiences for students hoping to pursue a career in Early Childhood Education. 

Points of Pride: 

• Ballad has operational expertise given 3 centers for almost 20 years, with 5 additional sites in less than 2 years and 1 more targeted to open in early 2025.  Current capacity allows for service to approximately 900 children 6 weeks to 5 years old and their families. 
• Ballad places a special emphasis on ensuring high quality by providing highly qualified staff, a guaranteed and viable curriculum, and three nutritious meals and snacks per day. 
• Ballad Health Centers for Early Learning are meeting the needs of working families by offering extended hours:  6:00 am to 7:00 pm daily, M-F, including all holidays with the exception of Thanksgiving and Christmas Day. 

Chambliss Center for Children’s Micro-center Expansion initiative aims to increase the availability of small, mixed-age childcare programs across Chattanooga/Hamilton County, particularly for infants and toddlers. 

• Micro-Center Model: Provides care for up to 12 children, ages six weeks to five years, using a Family Group Home license but in business or community settings rather than homes. 
• Expansion into Businesses and Community Buildings: Aims to establish micro-centers in locations such as businesses and public buildings to broaden access to high-quality childcare. 
• Support Structure: Operates under Chambliss Center’s Shared Service model, offering centralized finance, technology, HR, and administrative support for each site. 
• Oversight and Staffing: Each micro-center is managed by a Director and Assistant Director, employing a small team of teachers to deliver care in these close-knit settings. 

The expansion, which began in March 2024, focuses on identifying and establishing new host sites and meeting the community’s childcare needs by increasing available seats for young children. Chambliss Center plans to open another micro-center site in 2025. 

Porter Leath’s Early Success Coalition (ESC) fosters collaboration among early childhood and social service providers in Memphis/Shelby County, piloting innovative systems to improve access to early childhood services and evidence-based home visiting programs. Examples include: 

• No Wrong Door Referral System: Provides a coordinated entry point for families, reducing duplication of services and ensuring families are connected to appropriate resources. 
• Tennessee Early Connect (TEC): Enhances access to Maternal, Infant, and Early Childhood Home Visiting (MIECHV)-funded evidence-based home visitation (EBHV) for pregnant individuals with complex needs. TEC’s work includes expanding strategic innovations, increasing referral sources, and enhancing referral quality to EBHV. 
• As of August 2024, the Tennessee Department of Health (TDH) Call Center facilitated 1,517 referrals for EBHV services. 
• Initially funded by a MIECHV Innovation grant through September 2024, with continued funding from the Tennessee Department of Health. 

The Early Success Coalition serves as an advocate and coordinator for early childhood programs, promoting a seamless, accessible support network for families. 

The Davidson County Child Care Landscape Study is a collaborative research initiative with the Prenatal-to-3 Policy Impact Center at Vanderbilt University. It aims to analyze the availability and demand for regulated child care for children ages five and younger in Davidson County. 

• Study Scope: Phase I assesses both the current supply of regulated child care and the population demographics of Davidson County, identifying factors that influence child care demand. 
• Purpose: Aims to create a detailed view of child care availability across the county to address the diverse needs of a population of over 700,000, reflecting varied jobs, incomes, and family preferences. 
• Impact: The findings will guide elected officials, early childhood advocates, and business leaders in making data-informed decisions on establishing new centers or expanding existing ones in high-need areas across Davidson County. 

This study is intended to support strategic growth in the child care sector, ensuring access aligns with the community’s evolving needs. 

NE TN GROWSS (Northeast Tennessee: Guiding Resilience and Optimal Wellness for Strong Starts) is a federal (HRSA) grant-funded effort to implement Healthy Steps and Help Me Grow! programming in 9 counties in East/Northeast Tennessee. These programs support families with children 0-5 by adding specially trained community health workers to the pediatrician’s staff to increase effective screening, awareness, and response to developmental and relational concerns; increase utilization of local resources; and support access to resources outside of the geographical area through telehealth. Key programmatic aspects include:

• Emphasis on role of Community Health Workers embedded in pediatric practices to support integrated care, promotion, and prevention level supports for young children and families
• Closed loop, county-level, referral systems for young children through Help Me Grow!
• Opportunity to clearly identify impact of IECMH-focused integrated care in rural areas of TN.

Points of Pride:  

• Partnerships with AIMHiTN, ETSU, Mountain View Pediatrics, Newport Pediatrics, Servolution Health Systems, TNAAP, and others
• HRSA funding from October 2024-September of 2029

In a groundbreaking move, the Clarksville-Montgomery County Industrial Development Board (IDB) has leveraged innovative economic tools to address a critical workforce need: childcare.  Using Tennessee’s Payment in Lieu of Taxes (PILOTs) economic incentive and land donation, the IDB was able to attract a childcare operator – The Youth Academy – to serve the children and families who work in the 40+ businesses located in the industrial park. 

• Issued an RFP, offering land donation and PILOTs to the selected winner. 
• The Youth Academy industrial park successfully opened in August 2024. 
• Created 800 new FT slots with half offered at 15% discount to industrial park employees and active-duty military personnel.
• Operates from 5am to midnight, addressing nontraditional hours childcare needs for early and later shift workers 

Points of Pride: 

• Innovative use of economic development tools can be creatively applied to addressing childcare needs. 
• Beautiful, multi-purpose facility established to serve young children prior to kindergarten, as well as before- and after-school and summer camp services for school age children. 
• In addition to childcare needs being addressed, 130 new jobs were created to operate the early care and education services. 

Childcare Northeast Tennessee (CNET) Initiative is a part of the Workforce & Literacy department at FTDD and was created in response to the challenges of the lack of access to childcare, the struggles of childcare providers to open and remain so, as well as the effects of the lack of access of childcare on employment in NETN.  Through engaging childcare providers, CNET has worked to identify the specific and significant challenges that childcare providers face when navigating licensure, local and state rules and regulations, funding and staffing. Using a multi-faceted approach, CNET is working to galvanize the community and leverage existing networks to help address these challenges. 

• CNET is developing childcare toolkits for new providers, existing providers and employers seeking to support their employees’ childcare needs 
• CNET is engaging with local and state safety officials as well as licensure specialists, such as the Childcare Certificate Program, to help providers navigate these necessary challenges 
• CNET is engaging employers to inform them about the effects of childcare on their bottom line and help them assess and address the childcare challenges they face 
• CNET offers customized solutions for both childcare providers and employers through leveraging existing networks within the community to help with locations and procurement as well as strategic partnerships 
• CNET seeks funding and support for programs to support childcare providers, employers, and ECE educational opportunities to grow a pipeline of teachers for childcare.  

Partnership Projects 

• CAM Industrial Childcare Project: including UETHDA, NeSCC, City of Kingsport, FTDD/CNET 
• Local School District: working on exploring childcare for employees and students, while offering hands on experience and mentoring for CTE ECE High School program  
• Partnerships with existing programs serving marginalized communities to help support and create opportunities for self-sustaining life and career pathways, by engaging community partners; such as employers, local government officials, economic development districts, chambers of commerce and non-profit organizations. 

The Lovin’ on Our Babies: Assessment of the Social-Emotional Landscape in Memphis and Shelby County, Tennessee was conducted to help First 8 Memphis understand how families and professionals (including child care providers, Pre-K teachers, social workers, family support workers, etc.) are caring for and nurturing young children in our community.

Organized by the key levers of a healthy early care and education system – quality, access, awareness, and advocacy – and fueled by the shared wisdom and insight of families, providers, and system leaders who anchored the landscape process, this report: