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Lacey Hays on the Power of Parent Voice & Advocacy

Lacey Hays on the Power of Parent Voice & Advocacy

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

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.

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

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

by | 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.

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

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

by | Jun 21, 2022 | Podcast, Parents and Families, 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.

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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Building an Infrastructure for Early Learning & Care with Alyssa Chatterjee

Building an Infrastructure for Early Learning & Care with Alyssa Chatterjee

by | Jun 13, 2022 | Oregon Policy, Podcast

Guest

In this episode, we hear from Alyssa Chatterjee, director of the Early Learning Division at the Oregon Department of Education, who will oversee the transition as the division becomes the Department of Early Learning and Care. Alyssa was among the first employees at the Early Learning Division, when it was formally created. She has served under Governor Kate Brown as deputy education policy advisor and has focused on early learning policy for the state since 2012.

Summary

In this segment, we learn more about Chatterjee’s background, her career path and its importance to her. We also dig into the Department of Early Learning and Care and how its creation will affect children and families in Oregon. Chatterjee also talks about how her work on the Children’s Cabinet and Racial Justice Council will show up in her new role, and what racial justice and equity means in the early childhood sector. She also gets into some of the challenges she’s faced in this job, lessons learned along the way, and what she thinks the early learning system will look like down the road.

Transcript

[00:00:00] Rafael Otto: Hi everyone. This is the Early Link Podcast. I’m Rafael Otto. Thanks for listening as always, you can catch us on 99.1 FM in the Portland metro every single week on Sundays at 4:30 PM or tune in at your convenience, wherever you find your podcasts, including iTunes, Spotify, and Amazon Music.

There’ve been lots of great developments in Oregon in the early childhood sector recently and today I’m talking with Alyssa Chattergee. She is the fifth Early Learning System Director and will oversee the transition as the division becomes. The Department of Early Learning and Care.

Alyssa was among the first employees at the Early Learning Division, when it was formally created and she has served under Governor Kate Brown as deputy education policy advisor and she has focused on early learning policy for the state since 2012.

Alyssa, welcome to the podcast.

[00:00:55] Alyssa Chatterjee: Thank you for having me.

[00:00:56] Rafael Otto: Yeah, it’s great to have you here. Give me a little bit of background about the how and why you came into… into this work. What led you here?

[00:01:04] Alyssa Chatterjee: Yeah. So I went to Willamette University as a politics major assuming that I would be an elementary school teacher. Did some work in the classroom, I had a lot of experience working in preschools and schools with children experiencing disabilities. And as I did some work in Salem, was getting a little disillusioned by just the stress that teachers were under. The pressure for testing, seeing, watching them make those choices to have to kind of leave kids behind. And what really sealed it for me, there was student I was helping and he had pretty severe ADHD and we sat down and he wrote a paragraph and that was a big deal. 

And I was like, “Go show your teacher,” and he ran up and he was so excited.

And the first thing she said was, “You’re not allowed to write in pen.” And I was just like, I don’t think I can do this job. 

And luckily, being a politics major, I happened to also be in an education policy class and realized there was another way to be a part of the education system without being in the classroom. And so I was very fortunate that I had a friend from college who was working in Governor Kitzhaber’s office at the time and said, ” There’s this new office called the Early Learning Council and they need an assistant to the director.” And so I started as a temp to the first director, Jada Rupley, back in September of 2012. And I stuck around,

So was very lucky that, I started three weeks after Jada. We were in all these meetings together trying to convince people, legislators, partners, that what happens before kindergarten matters. So I really got to come in on the ground floor, as you were creating the Early Learning Hubs, as we were becoming the Early Learning Division, and grow with the agency.

And I’ve benefited tremendously from that. And from just having different leaders help me grow and continue to lift me up, and give me those opportunities to learn, and then left to the governor’s office in 2019, and then came back to their learning division in ’21. So it’s been a journey.

[00:03:06] Rafael Otto: You know, there are a lot of people, I think that ended up working on the policy side of things who have had experience like you have had. You were in the classroom, you worked with young children. Are there any other stories about working with young kids that come to mind that help keep you motivated to do this work?

Please download the full transcript below.

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An Update on Preschool for All Multnomah County with Leslee Barnes

An Update on Preschool for All Multnomah County with Leslee Barnes

by | Jun 13, 2022 | Podcast, Preschool

Guest

On this segment of The Early Link, we’re following up with Leslee Barnes, director of the Preschool and Early Learning Division at Multnomah County, who gives us an update on the implementation of Preschool for All (PFA) in Multnomah County. Barnes is a fourth-generation Oregonian who grew up in Northeast Portland, and a leading figure working alongside commissioner Jessica Vega Pederson, in the development of Preschool for All which was approved by voters in November 2020.

Summary

In our conversation with Leslee Barnes, she talks about the demands, challenges, successes, and surprises in the implementation of Preschool for All. She also discusses how culturally and linguistically diverse providers are supported in their participation, and ultimately whether PFA will help everyone involved. This includes the growing educational workforce, which would ideally reflect the diversity of families. The conversation then shifts to a discussion around facilities. Specifically, knowing that the lack of them was a roadblock in getting PFA off the ground and how they will be supported this time around. Barnes also covers the PFA rollout and how the upcoming ban on suspension and expulsion could potentially interrelate, plus how lessons learned at these early stages could inform statewide work and potential expansions to other counties.

Transcript

[00:00:00] Rafael Otto: Hi everyone. This is the Early Link Podcast. I’m Rafael Otto. Thanks for tuning in each week. I hope you do on Sundays at 4:30 PM. We are broadcasting on 99.1 FM in the Portland Metro, you can find us streaming there as well. Or you can tune in at your convenience wherever you find your podcasts, including iTunes, Spotify, and Amazon Music, and as always on our website at childinst.org.

Today, I’m speaking with Leslee Barnes, director of the Preschool and Early Learning Division at Multnomah County. She is a fourth generation Oregonian who grew up in Northeast Portland and she has been a leading figure, working alongside others in the community, including Commissioner Jessica Vega Peterson in the development of Preschool for All which was approved by voters in November of 2020. Things have come a long way since then. And we’re looking to get an update and just talk about what Preschool for All looks like today.

Leslee, welcome to the podcast.

[00:00:58] Leslee Barnes: Thanks for having me. Good to be back and give you kind of what’s hot and happening right now in the world of Preschool for All.

[00:01:05] Rafael Otto: Yeah, it’s great to have you back on here. You know, this has been really like, a groundbreaking measure that was passed, with a tax to go along with it, to fund Preschool for All and the expansion of facilities and those kinds of things. Really not just in Oregon, but nationally, this is really kind of the first of its kind in the country structured in this way

So just give us an update as to where things are right now, as we’re beginning to roll out. I know there was the initial application process that rolled out recently. Where’re things at?

[00:01:38] Leslee Barnes: Well, yeah, so that application became live to the public back in April, and we got an astounding 1100 applications from families. We have about 675 slots so we’re in the midst of looking at those applications, sorting, matching. I mean, there’s a lot to think about when you’re thinking about what families want, what’s available right now in this leg of our implementation.

So that’s where we’re kind of at right now. I’m really hoping that, our initial thoughts that parents would get notification of their choice and ability to be matched in July. But we’re thinking that might come actually a little bit sooner. So, that’s where we’re at right now. So it’s pretty…

[00:02:17] Rafael Otto: So demand has been high.

[00:02:19] Leslee Barnes: Very high, very high, yes. But you know, not surprising, right? This has been something the community said they wanted it, needed it for a long time. So it’s aligned to what we had hoped would happen.

Please download the full transcript below.

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