Healthy Families

Healthy Families has provided health based family support home visits since 2000.  This program is based out of Kossuth and Palo Alto community health, but has achieved its strength from collaboration with the AEA KIDS program, WIC, FAADS, and local Care Team.  It works primarily with prenatal moms through infants up to 1year.

Healthy Families helps families prepare for the birth of a new baby and aids in the adjustment of the young child as he/she grows.  When you enroll in Healthy Families, a registered nurse will

• Make home visits during your pregnancy and/or after the birth of your baby.
• Offer support, guidance and answer questions on your baby’s health, safety, growth and development.
• Provide information on immunizations and inform you of community resources. 
   

KIDS Program

The Prairie Lakes AEA KIDS program is a home based program that helps support families as their child grows.  KIDS provides parent education, child development, and family support services.  When you enroll in the KIDS program, you will be offered:

• Information and support on your children’s development. 
• Practical ways to encourage learning, manage behavior, and build strong parent-child relationships.
• Developmental screenings
• Connections with other community resources and services 

Visits are scheduled at your family’s convenience.  KIDS’ services are voluntary, confidential and free. 

Contact: (866) 540-3855 or call your local AEA office

Growing Together

    Growing Together is a parent education program that works in collaboration with local school districts to provide a fun learning rich environment for both parents and children.  When you enroll in a Growing Together class:

• Children and parents attend programs together in local preschools giving children and their parents a familiarity with the school.

•  Upon entering the class, children and parents are given a variety of developmentally appropriate activities to do together.  Teachers will provide a link between the activity and how it fits into the Iowa Early Learning Standards.

• Classes provides a bonding time for parent and child while modeling kindergarten readiness skills. 

• Parents and children have a teacher lead circle time together consisting of a story, finger-plays and song. 

• After circle time, children have a snack and free play time while parents participate in a discussion with information on parenting topics.  Topics and information center on parenting skills, health and safety issues and early literacy. 

Contact:  (515) 295-7784   (866) 540-3855

Respite Parent Support and Education

     Both counties have a respite care program for families.  We provide financial support for these programs to provide extra care for children and parent education for families.   This program works in collaboration with the KIDS program and Healthy Families to provide respite care for families with young children.  Drop in childcare is very difficult to find and provides care for children to help relieve family stress.    It also gives parents the opportunity for support while they attend classes, dr. appointments, and run errands.  Both programs have as a requirement that parents attend parent education classes either monthly or bi-monthly.  When you attend respite nursery:

• Children receive quality childcare and participate in developmentally appropriate activities.

• Parents receive training on a variety of topics such as fun ideas to do with children, kindergarten readiness and other parenting topics.

• Parents can feel secure that their child is well cared for as they run errands, attend classes, or simply have some time for themselves. 

• As we support safe and nurturing families, we are equipping children with the skills needed for school readiness. 

Preschool Tuition Assistance

One goal of PAK Empowerment has been that Quality childcare be accessible to all families.  A reason for this goal is that we know quality directly relates to child development and school readiness.  In the past we had a scholarship program which helped those children whose family income could not afford a quality preschool pay for it.  Scholarships required preschools to have a quality component.  This made for an easy transition into our current tuition assistance program. 

Under the current program, preschools apply for tuition assistance dollars to pay for those children who qualify.  Preschools are then required to participate in quality improvement such as QPPS.  PAK has advertised in the local newspapers and radio that money is available for tuition assistance.  To find out if your family qualifies for PAK Empowerment to pay for your tuition, contact:  your local preschool for an application or call (515) 295-7784   

Family Resource Coordinator

The Family Resource Coordinator is a new position whose primary goal centers on quality preschool support and parent education.  Supporting the Iowa Early Learning Standards, this person provides training and support to preschools to enable them to provide quality preschool programming.  This person also coordinates Growing Together, a parent education program that provides parent training as well as developmentally appropriate activities.  Parents are made aware as to how these activities coordinate with the Iowa Early Learning Standards.  As a preschool working with the Family Resource Coordinator you will receive:

• QPPS (Quality Preschool Program Standards) support – The coordinator works with the preschool in self-assessment, creating goals and working on an action plan to increase and enhance the quality of the preschool.

• Literacy promotion visits scheduled at your convenience in your preschool.  The Coordinator provides a story and activity for the children and information to the teachers as to how it ties in with the Iowa Early Learning Standards.

Contact: Sara Curtis (515) 295-7784

Quality Improvement Stipends

This year PAK is proposing to fund stipends for preschools and childcare locations that participate in QPPS or QRS (level 3 – 5).  Increasing the level of quality requires effort and time on the part of preschool teachers and childcare providers.  We are hoping this money provides an incentive for locations to participate.  This program was new for 2007 and we are hoping that we will see an increase in the number of registered providers and the numbers of providers and teachers in attendance at trainings.  We also expect to see an increase in the % of children with kindergarten readiness skills.  We have been keeping track with kindergarten readiness surveys the % of children with kindergarten readiness skills.  In the future we will be able to correlate those findings and compare the readiness skill of children coming out of participating quality programs with those coming out of not participating programs.  Of course our goal will be that all preschool programs participate in quality improvement making a correlation not needed.

Professional Development

This funding is used to provide professional development for childcare providers and preschool educators.  In 2007, a collaborative effort was made by the AEA, Local Community College, Childcare Resource and Referral, and local Empowerment Areas to bring in a speaker on fun research based math and science ideas.  30 from our area participated in this training.  Training put on by Creative Curriculum on assessing children’s knowledge and skills was offered for preschool teachers and care providers.

Child Care Coordinator

The purpose of the Child Care Coordinator is to provide assistance and support to home providers, and child care centers so that they can provide the highest quality childcare possible.  This person has been working with our local programs in both Kossuth and Palo Alto for the past five years and has developed a trusted relationship with them.  As a childcare care provider, if you choose to work with the Child Care Coordinator you will receive:

• Literacy promotion visits scheduled at your convenience in your home or center.  The Coordinator provides a story and activity for the children and information to the provider as to how it ties in with the Iowa Early Learning Standards.

• Monthly childcare provider meetings in each county.  This is a time to share information, and ideas as well as to receive training information.

• DHS offers training credits for monthly provider meetings.

• PAK Empowerment offers incentives for various provider meetings and work with the coordinator.  These incentives enrich the quality of the child care setting.

• Mini-grants.  PAK Empowerment offers mini-grants once a year to childcare providers.  This gives providers a chance to apply for toys and other items that would enrich the quality of their environment.

Contact: Kristin Faber (515) 295-7784

119 S. Jones St.      Algona, IA 50511      Phone:  (515)295-7784 or (866) 540-3855      Fax: (515) 295-3548      Email:  info@pakempowerment.com