February 2017
Dear Partnership Members and Friends,
Thank you for joining us on January 27 for our first quarterly meeting of the year. We hope the panel on Upstream Investing provided useful i  nsight on some of the innovative ways in which local leaders and school systems across the K-16 spectrum are investing in early learning for better long term educational, health and economic outcomes.
The Q&A portion following the panel also sparked a vibrant discussion on how all of us, together, can make the early years a cornerstone of local and state investment.
Following both the panel and large group discussion, we drew three important takeaways from the meeting:
- We need to harness local, bottom-up momentum to broaden public and political will for sustained investment in the early years. From Santa Monica to LAUSD, Pomona and others like Long Beach and Pasadena, there is a growing groundswell of local jurisdictions making significant investments in the early years as a key strategy toward reaching their academic, social and economic outcome goals.
- Communication is essential. Specifically, understanding key messages that move voters and decision-makers from supporters to early learning champions. We can look to both the Santa Monica and Pomona stories as case studies.
- The strength of our diversity should not be understated or undersold. As funders, public servants, business leaders, decision-makers, advocates and practitioners, we have a strong foundation of local bright spots and proof points upon which to build.
We hope you will join us in the days and weeks ahead as we continue to build strong alliances across the philanthropic community and public sector to advance our collective vision of making the early years one of the state’s seminal upstream investments.
Thank you.
Parker, Kaci, Steve, and Mary
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