Portland’s Islamic Preschool Program Offers High-Quality Early Learning, Connects Students to Culture & Community

by Rafael Otto | Jul 11, 2022 | Podcast, Oregon Policy, Preschool

On this segment of The Early Link Podcast, host Rafael Otto talks with Jawad Khan, chief programming officer at Muslim Educational Trust and a member of the Trust’s board of directors.

Guest:

Jawad Khan has spent 22 years with Muslim Educational Trust as a teacher, college counselor, and administrator, and previously worked in the tech industry. Khan is based in Beaverton, Oregon and is an advocate for expanding preschool in Washington County.

Summary:

Khan shares about the Muslim Educational Trust, including how many students served, the importance of preschool in their focus, and Khan’s own personal experiences with the children he has worked with. He also talks about how the Trust acts as a cultural navigator, why a culturally-specific approach is effective in education, and addresses some of the challenges for students who are not in a culturally-specific setting. Tying into this, Khan brings up how the school addresses anti-immigrant/anti-Muslim sentiments with students. Khan also discusses his work to expand preschool in Washington County, detailing progress and what he hopes to accomplish.

Children's Institute · Portland's Islamic Preschool Program Connects Students to Culture & Community

Transcript

[00:00:00] Rafael Otto: Hello everyone. This is the Early Link Podcast. I’m Rafael Otto. You can catch us on 99.1 FM in the Portland Metro on Sundays at 4:30pm or tune in at your convenience, wherever you find your podcasts. That includes iTunes, Spotify, Stitcher, and Amazon Music and as always on our website at childinst.org, where you can subscribe to our podcasts and our newsletter and learn more about our work in Oregon.

My guest today is Jawad Khan the chief programming officer at the Muslim Educational Trust and a member of the Trust’s board of directors. He has spent 22 years with the Trust as a teacher, college counselor, and administrator, and previously worked in the high-tech industry. He’s based in Beaverton, Oregon, and is an advocate for expanding preschool in Washington county,

Jawad, it’s great to have you here today.

[00:00:50] Jawad Khan: Thank you so much, Rafael. It’s a real pleasure to be here and looking forward to the conversation.

[00:00:55] Rafael Otto: I am too. And I would love to just start with more about your background. I know that you worked in the high-tech industry. You worked in the startup environment for a while, founded a company, and now you’ve been in the education world for more than two decades. Tell us about that background and how you came to the trust.

[00:01:12] Jawad Khan: Well, you know, I think it’s a little bit of a serendipitous journey. I think I look at it that way at least. I didn’t intend to work in the nonprofit and educational world when I started out. My parents immigrated here from India in the early seventies. I lived across the United States in multiple cities. Texas, California, Ohio, Colorado, Washington, South Carolina. I think a couple others I’m missing right now.

[00:01:37] Rafael Otto: All over!

[00:01:38] Jawad Khan: All over, all over. So I got to see a lot of great places. And I came to Oregon in the early nineties and finished high school here and went to college. I was going to, and I did actually, go out and work in the high-tech industry for a bit and then I started my own startup, as you mentioned, and with my friends from college, and we wind up selling that. And I was going to go to business school maybe after that. But I received an email from the Muslim Educational Trust, asking if I would like to teach. And really something like this organization and it’s very unique and the way that it addresses holistically, a lot of the challenges that the immigrant refugee population faces in a new world. I would have loved to be part of such an organization or be part of such a school when I was growing up. So I decided to defer business school and go and teach and I’ve been here ever since. And it’s been a real pleasure and a real joy to be part of this, and has also given me that experience about how much difference education can make.

[00:02:43] Rafael Otto: Tell me more about the trust. You have preschool classrooms all the way through grade 12. How many students do you serve? Tell me more about what your school looks like.

Please download the full transcript below.

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Abogando por Preescolar para Todos con Yasmin Martinez y Bridget Cooke

by Rafael Otto | Jun 29, 2022 | Podcast, Preschool

Éste es nuestro primer podcast en español, y queremos agradecer a nuestras invitadas y a nuestro colega Yonny Castillo-Flores por apoyar la producción.

Invitadas y Resumen:

En éste podcast, una de las invitadas es Bridget Cooke, la directora ejecutiva de Adelante Mujeres, cuya experiencia incluye trabajar con familias y mujeres inmigrantes y organizaciones sin fines de lucro en Oregon, California y Chile.

También estamos acompañados por Yasmin Martinez, una madre que aboga para los niños y las familias de su comunidad, en el condado de Washington aquí en Oregon.

Ambas están involucradas en el esfuerzo de traer preescolar para todos los niños de tres y cuatro años y están trabajando para llevar este empeño en la boleta electoral este noviembre.

Pueden escuchar a su conveniencia donde quiera que encuentren sus podcasts, incluyendo Apple Podcasts, Spotify, y Amazon Music. Y como siempre, en nuestra página de Internet en childinst.org donde puede suscribirse a nuestros podcasts y nuestro boletín informativo para obtener más información sobre nuestro trabajo en Oregon.

Children's Institute · Abogando por Preescolar para Todos con Yasmin Martinez y Bridget Cooke

Transcripción

Rafael Otto: Hola a todos. Este es el podcast The Early Link, soy, Rafael Otto. Gracias por acompañarnos. Pueden escuchar a su conveniencia donde quiera que encuentren sus podcasts, incluyendo Apple Podcasts, Spotify, y Amazon Music. Y como siempre, en nuestra página de internet en childinst.org donde puede suscribirse a nuestros podcasts y nuestro boletín informativo para obtener más información sobre nuestro trabajo en Oregon.

Este es nuestro primer podcast en español, y quiero agradecer a nuestras invitadas y a mi colega Yonny Castillo-Flores por apoyar la producción.

Una de mis invitadas hoy es Bridget Cooke, la directora ejecutiva de Adelante Mujeres, cuya experiencia incluye trabajar con familias y mujeres inmigrantes y organizaciones sin fines de lucro en Oregon, California y Chile. También estamos acompañados hoy por Yasmin Martínez, una madre que aboga para los niños y las familias de su comunidad, el condado de Washington aquí en Oregon. Ambas están involucradas en el esfuerzo de traer preescolar para todos los niños de tres y cuatro años y están trabajando para llevar este empeño en la boleta electoral este noviembre.

Yasmin Martinez: Muchas gracias.

Bridget Cooke: Si, un gusto estar aquí con ustedes.

Rafael Otto: Yasmin y Bridget continuarían la conversación, y comenzaran a explicar por qué están involucradas en el esfuerzo para aprobar preescolar para todos en el condado de Washington.

Yasmin Martinez: Bueno, quiero empezar dando las gracias por esta oportunidad. Bridget me invito directamente. Yo soy una mama de un preescolar que está en su programa preescolar. Entonces cuando me invito, realmente al momento no pensé que tan gigante esto podría ser. Pero a través de un tiempo me di cuenta de que, esta me abrió la mente, y es una gran oportunidad, no solo para los estudiantes de preescolar, sino para la comunidad y el futuro de nuestra comunidad. ¿Verdad? Creo que es sumamente importante porque esta rellenando una aria donde unos niños pueden aprovecharse gran mente y pues eso es sumamente importante porque es el base. El base para un niño, el futuro del estudiante y de familias y la comunidad.

Bridget Cooke: Que interesante Yasmin, me encanta como has dicho eso, de que después te diste cuenta de que realmente es un esfuerzo gigante con un impacto gigante. Y antes de decir porque yo me he involucrado en este esfuerzo. ¿Quiero saber un poco más de lo que tú esperas lograr? Que es lo que preescolar para todos significara para todas las comunidades.

Yasmin Martinez: Creo que el preescolar para todos es una gran oportunidad para hacer cambios. Cambios para mejorar, como les digo, no solamente en ese estudiante, esa familia, y a nivel comunitario, hacemos un mejor futuro para todos. ¿Y darle la oportunidad a los que no han tenido esa oportunidad, verdad? Porque preescolar para todos es eso, para todos que no tienen esa oportunidad hasta hoy en día.

Bridget Cooke: Si. Que lindo seria. ¿No? Yo creo que mi involucramiento viene de ser la directora ejecutiva y cofundadora de Adelante Mujeres. Y precisamente cuando comenzamos la organización hace veinte años, estábamos mirando cuales son los obstáculos que impiden a que la mujer logre sus sueños, la mujer latina inmigrante. Porque vienen aquí con muchos anhelos, con muchas esperanzas para sus hijos, pero después encuentran a todo el mundo desconocido y hace muy difícil saber cómo realmente apoyar y hacer realidad estos sueños para sus hijos. Entonces hicimos un análisis, muchas conversaciones con mujeres latinas inmigrantes y todas querían volver a estudiar. Habían tenido que dejar la escuela tal vez después de la primaria, o puede ser que ni lograron terminar estos seis años. Entonces, yo reflexionando de como las mujeres enfrentan estas barreras, nos dimos cuenta de que, aunque hay muchos programas, no estaban diseñados con la mujer latina y sus necesidades en mente. Y por supuesto, una clave para eso es asegurar que hay cuidado de niños mientras la mujer esa estudiando. Que los niños puedan estar en un lugar seguro, un lugar de confianza. Entonces lanzamos la organización. Las mujeres están con nosotros estudiando sacando sus GED, estudiando inglés, liderazgo y crecimiento personal mientras sus niños bien cuidaditos en el cuidado de niños. Pero nos dimos cuenta de que tenemos a los niños con nosotros, seis horas diarias, hay que aprovechar más y ofrecerles a ellos también un espacio y una oportunidad educacional. Entonces tomamos como un año de reestructurar el programa para aumentar el nivel de servicio y asegurar que las maestras estén bien preparadas para realmente hacer funcionar un espacio de educacional y que deferencia, comenzamos a ver desde ese punto para los niños, pero también para todas las familias.

Entonces, ahora, como organización, tenemos ocho salones de educación de temprana edad. Cuatro que son preescolares y cuatros que son para infantes y caminadores. Pero, aunque es bellísimo y nos encanta ofrecer estos salones y oportunidad a la comunidad, casi diariamente recibimos llamadas de las familias buscando un lugar seguro para sus hijos. A veces ganan demasiado para poder participar en Head Start. Pues como sabes, para una familia de cuatro no se puede ganar más de treinta y cinco mil. Igual con treinta y cinco mil casi no se puede vivir. Entonces ganaban un poco más y también nosotros no teníamos campo para ellos. Entonces vimos esto preescolar y nos hemos metido completamente como organización. Fui la co-chair del task force este ano, comenzando en mayo del año pasado y ahora soy la que coordina el equipo de organizadores, no para hacer realidad Este proyecto.

Y tenemos otros miembros de nuestro personal como Patricia Alvarado que están en comité contigo. ¿No es cierto?

Por favor, descargar la transcripción.

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Lacey Hays on the Power of Parent Voice & Advocacy

by Rafael Otto | Jun 29, 2022 | Preschool, Parents and Families, Podcast

On this episode of the Early Link Podcast, host Rafael Otto speaks with Lacey Hays, a parent and advocate in Washington County here in Oregon. She’s currently co-chair for the Early Learning Washington County Steering Committee and a member of both the Preschool for All Technical Advisory Committee and the Organizing and Outreach Committee. All of that work is in support of establishing Preschool for All in Washington County.

Guest:

Lacey Hays has lived with her wife, eight-year-old son, and a menagerie of pets in Hillsboro, Oregon on the border of where the city meets the forest. For the past seven years she’s been a strong parent voice for equitable early childhood education and early childhood special education in Washington County and the state of Oregon, participating in and, at times, chairing committees dedicated to creating policies that work for parents and providers in our community. When she takes off her advocacy hat, she can be found editing manuscripts, writing hopeful science fiction stories, and exploring the vast and beautiful wild places of Oregon with her wonderful family.

Summary:

In this segment, Hays shares the story of her son and how he has helped drive her advocacy work. As an active parent advocate in Washington County, she details all of the work she is currently involved in and how she balances being a parent. Hays also speaks to the importance of parent voice in policy development and improving access to various parts of the early childhood system, such as early intervention, special education, and preschool. Because of Hays’ involvement with the implementation of Preschool for All (PFA) in Washington County, she also addresses the similarities and differences between Washington and Multnomah County’s PFA strategies, and what she hopes to achieve with it in the future.

Children's Institute · Lacey Hays on the Power of Parent Voice & Advocacy in Early Childhood

Transcript

[00:00:00] Rafael Otto: Hello everyone. This is the Early Link Podcast. I’m Rafael Otto. I appreciate you tuning in. You can catch us on 99.1 FM in the Portland Metro on Sundays at 4:30 pm or tune in at your convenience, wherever you find your podcasts, including iTunes, Spotify, and Amazon Music. And as always on our website @ childinst.org. You can visit us there and stay up to date by subscribing to our newsletter and podcasts. Today, I’m speaking with Lacey Hays, a parent and advocate in Washington County here in Oregon. She’s currently co-chair for the Early Learning Washington County Steering Committee and a member of both the Preschool for All Technical Advisory Committee and the Organizing and Outreach Committees. All of that work is in support of establishing Preschool for All in Washington county.

Lacey, it’s great to have you on the podcast today.

[00:00:51] Lacey Hays: Thank you for having me.

[00:00:53] Rafael Otto: Lacey, would you be willing to share the story of your son? Because in talking with you, it’s my understanding that… that has been a driver for what you’re doing these days as an advocate for young children. Would you mind sharing that story with us?

[00:01:06] Lacey Hays: Yeah, my son is the reason for all of this. He was born in 2013, just a normal childbirth. And for the first few months of his life seemed to be, or everyday typical baby, sleeping, crying, eating. And around sixteen months though, we started to notice that while he was walking and crawling and meeting other milestones, he still wasn’t speaking. So we weren’t getting “mama,” we weren’t getting pointing. So during his 16 month checkup, we talked to his doctor and she said, “Hey, I can send you guys over to early intervention, but if you guys wanted to wait just a month or two, just to see if he catches up, because it’s still a little early and he’s not outside the range of normal we can do that, too.”

We got the early intervention referral in and we decided we were going to wait before we actually called on it. At about 17 months, we were giving him a bath. We had these little foam letters that you can stick to the wall in the bathtub and we’d tell him the letter name. And so he picks up the “O” and he goes, “Ooh.” And I look at him and I’m like, “Well that’s just a coincidence. Babies make lots of noises.” So we stuck it to the wall and he picks up the “T” and he goes, “Te.” I’m like, “Okay, that’s getting kind of strange.” So I pick up the “E” and he goes, “Eh.” I’m like, “Okay.” I have a background in English education. It’s my degree. And one of the classes we’re required to take is language acquisition and immediately I was like, “Well, that’s very unusual, kind of backwards language acquisition. He can’t speak, but he’s reading letters. This is really unusual.” So we went to early intervention and we found out that he had a receptive and expressive language delay.

They also looked and said, “Does he ever stop moving?” He’s my only child. I said, “well, no, but he’s one. It’s not normal?” And they said, “Well, he’s moving a little bit more than you would expect for a, for a one-year-old, 12 months plus.” They thought that maybe he wasn’t slowing down long enough to focus on the environment around him to actually take in language.

[00:03:28] Rafael Otto: Okay.

[00:03:30] Lacey Hays: So we went on this adventure with early intervention. We started having home visits and they were wonderful. Our teacher, Amy, is still holds a really special place in our heart. And as we started exploring more over the next year. We realized that he could also read a little bit by the time he was two. He wouldn’t do it on cue, but he would just read something off of a sign every once in a while.

Please download the full transcript below.

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Prioritizing Early Childhood in Oregon: A Discussion with State Rep. Karin Power & Rep. Jack Zika

by Rafael Otto | Jun 22, 2022 | Child Care, Oregon Policy, Podcast, Policy Trends

In this episode, host Rafael Otto speaks with Oregon state representatives Karin Power (D), representing Milwaukie, Sellwood, and Southeast Portland, and Jack Zika (R), representing Redmond. Power and Zika serve as the chair and vice-chair of the House Committee on Early Childhood, and both are retiring this year amid historic turnover in the legislature. They have both been early childhood champions and we are grateful for their efforts over the years!

Summary

Both Reps. discuss why early childhood is important to them, and explain the significance of an early childhood committee in the legislature. They discuss legislative priorities in Oregon’s early childhood sector, such as supporting the expansion of facilities and strengthening the workforce, and share what they’re hearing from their constituents.

With both of their terms concluding next January, they talk through what it would take to make sure early childhood remains a legislative priority, how communities can assist and engage, and offer advice to incoming legislators.

Guests

Representative Karin Power grew up in a small town in New Jersey and went to Mount Holyoke College in western Massachusetts before moving to the west coast. She’s spent time in Geneva, Washington, D.C., Boston, Seattle, and Portland before making her home in Milwaukie. Rep. Power and her wife live in Milwaukie with their toddler and two rescue dogs. In her other job, Rep. Power is associate general counsel for The Freshwater Trust. She is a graduate of Lewis & Clark Law School.

As a new mother and first-time homeowner, Rep. Power knows how crucial stable housing and public education are to building successful families and communities. Rep. Power is also the first LGBT woman elected to serve House District 41. She understands how important it is to make our government more accessible, and champions equitable policies, both for the Oregon we are today and for the generations yet to come.

Representative Jack Zika was born in Ohio and attended the University of Cincinnati. He worked as a securities trader and, immediately prior to his election to the Oregon House of Representatives, as a realtor in Bend.

Rep. Zika and his family love Central Oregon and he considers it an honor to represent the region. His interest in affordable housing and other kitchen-table issues like child care comes from the fact that he and his wife Zanthel are raising two young children in Redmond. In addition to housing and child care, Rep. Zika has worked on legislation to help Central Oregon’s veterans from his position on the Veterans and Emergency Preparedness Committee, and also on wildfire prevention.

Children's Institute · Prioritizing Early Childhood in Oregon: A Discussion with State Rep. Karin Power and Rep. Jack Zika

Transcript

Coming soon!

Please download the full transcript below.

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Portland’s Mxm Bloc is Eliminating Barriers for Black Moms & Their Children

by Rafael Otto | Jun 21, 2022 | Parents and Families, Podcast, Equity

Guest

In this segment of The Early Link Podcast, host Rafael Otto speaks with Rashelle Chase-Miller, who is an activist and a mom. She’s authored many articles and works in early childhood curriculum development. She’s also founder of Mxm Bloc, a Black mxm led mutual-aid group that supports Black families, and Reproductive Rights PDX.

Summary

Children’s Institute’s CEO, Kali Thorne-Ladd starts the episode with a discussion about the Uvalde shooting, and how this event impacted Chase-Miller, specifically as a Black mother, and her community. Chase-Miller notes the way in which she has helped the community come together in healing and activism, in the two years following the murder of George Floyd.

Chase-Miller goes on to talk about her son who was diagnosed with spastic diplegia cerebral palsy at 18 months old, and how this turned her to activism. Receiving her Master’s at Portland State University has also helped her to better advocate for him. Given her personal experience and her study of early childhood, she also gives advice to teachers and providers on how to really think about transforming and strengthening the way that the education the system serves kids like her son. She also talks about her writing about trauma responsiveness and what that can look like in early childhood settings, especially given the context of the news and the events that have been happening around the country.

Children's Institute · Portland's Mxm Bloc is Eliminating Barriers for Black Moms & Their Children

Transcript

[00:00:00] Rafael Otto: Welcome to the Early Link Podcast. I’m Rafael Otto. Thank you for listening. You can always catch us on the airwaves in the Portland Metro area on 99.1 FM on Sundays at 4:30 PM or you can tune in at your convenience wherever you find your podcasts. That includes iTunes, Spotify, and Amazon Music and as always on our website at childinst.org. I encourage you to visit.

Today I’m speaking with Rashelle Chase-Miller, who is an activist and a mom. She’s authored many articles and works in early childhood curriculum development. She’s also founder of Mxm Bloc, a Black mxm led mutual-aid group, supporting Black families and Reproductive Rights PDX.

Rashelle, welcome to the podcast today.

[00:00:44] Rashelle Chase-Miller: Thank you. Happy to be here.

[00:00:46] Rafael Otto: We’re going to start things off. My colleague has joined us today, Kali Thorne Ladd. She is going to start with a few questions for you to get us going. Kali, I’ll turn it over to you.

[00:00:55] Kali Thorne Ladd: Thank you, Rafael. Well, it’s such a pleasure to have Rashelle on the podcast, especially this week. That was a week really heavy when it comes to children. And I know you both as an education leader, early childhood leader, but also as a mom, and an activist from that place as a mother and also a Black mother.

And so, as the founder of PDX Mxm Bloc and how you engage Black moms or Black affiliating moms in the movement of Black Lives Matter, I think as a Black mother, we carry this other burden for our children around their safety. And I really want to hear from you about how this week impacted you and the people in your community, and any words of wisdom that you have to give to people.

[00:01:45] Rashelle Chase-Miller: Yeah. You know, this week was ghastly, I think, for parents. But you know, anyone who cares about children, it was a ghastly week in a series of, pretty ghastly weeks. I think that what happened in Texas and the victims being young children, the level of horror is hard to articulate with words. But of course, that also comes just a couple of weeks after the shooting in Buffalo, which was primarily black elders. And so, as someone in my forties who has young children on the one hand and older parents on the other end of the spectrum, phew, it’s just been a, you know, the experience of like, walking around with your heart in your throats just for weeks now. I think that the community response that I’ve witnessed has really just been this collective grief and anguish and feeling of, you know, I was going to say feeling of helplessness. And I do think that there’s some of that, but I also think that there has been more resistance to the idea that this is just how it is.

Then I recall seeing and feeling and experiencing in the past, and from the activism spaces that I operate in, really just seeing folks unwilling to throw their hands up, unwilling to believe that there’s nothing that we can do about this. And I’m really seeing folks lean in and engage. And whether it’s the small things like signing petitions online and writing letters, or the larger things like showing up for in-person actions or participating in general strikes. I think that there’s this collective recognition that this is intolerable and we can’t continue on this way.

I’m certainly not the one with any particular wisdom, I think in the face of just events that you just can’t understand. But I do think that these kinds of events are as preventable as they are predictable. How we care for our most vulnerable people, how we show up for our children, the kinds of climates that we foster in our schools and the kinds of supports that we give to our families have everything to do with who our young people grow to be. Whether they feel so disconnected and alienated that they turned to violence, or whether they have the skills and the resiliency to persevere through challenges and come out on the other side. So, I do not know that there is a silver lining to be found. But I do think so much of what we’re experiencing now and struggling with, we have the knowledge and the skills and the tools to combat. I think the question is do we have the will.

Please download the full transcript below.

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