School Readiness Consulting (SRC) to complete Strategic Plan for Michigan’s Preschool Development Grant, Birth through Five (PDG B-5).

The Michigan Department of Education Office of Great Start awards School Readiness Consulting (SRC) a contract to complete the state’s Strategic Plan to guide the continued development of the Mixed Delivery Early Childhood System, as required by Michigan’s Preschool Development Grant, Birth through Five (PDG B-5).

The PDG B-5 offers Michigan an excellent opportunity to build on the findings of the required Needs Assessment of its early care and education system, which includes home visitation services, early intervention services, Child Development and Care, state-funded preschool, Head Start/Early Head Start, the Great Start Collaboratives, the Great Start Parent Coalitions, and private-pay early care and education settings.

SRC is prepared to work collaboratively with the American Institutes for Research (AIR), who is completing the Needs Assessment, to engage stakeholders in conversations and visioning to inform a long-term strategic plan to help build the system. SRC combines strategic counsel, tactical support, and analytic expertise to provide clients with solutions that increase equity, quality, and opportunity in early childhood systems—creating the conditions for all children to thrive. The team at SRC believes that improving early childhood represents the greatest opportunity to create a just society.

The goals of the PDG B-5 Strategic Plan activity are to help support children and families across the mixed-delivery system by maximizing the availability of high-quality early care and education while improving the quality of care, streamlining administrative infrastructure, and creating efficiencies. As part of the grant, states are to:

• Conduct a comprehensive statewide birth through five needs assessment
• Develop an in-depth strategic plan
• Enhance parent choice, and
• Expand the current mixed delivery system consisting of a wide range of provider types and settings, including child care centers and home-based child care providers, Head Start and Early Head Start, state pre-kindergarten, and home visiting service providers across the public, private and faith-based sectors.

The PDG B-5 is authorized under the Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA), and is jointly administered by the U.S. Departments of Health and Human Services and Education.  More information can be accessed at the PDG B-5 link on the Prenatal through Age 8 (P-8) Priority Initiative webpage  or by emailing Joy Milano, PDG B-5 Project Manager, at milanoj@michigan.gov.