Most parents or caregivers of young children can attest that raising safe, happy, healthy, thriving kids takes support. We are fortunate to have many services and resources that can help connect and support families in King County. However, too often it’s hard for families to learn about or connect to those services, or to find other families to connect with and get support from. We heard from families in King County about the successes, gaps and disparities related to developmental screenings, referrals and connections to services. Families and providers want better connections to services and resources. Providers also want to coordinate better with each other in order to serve families better. They’ve challenged Best Starts for Kids to fund more partnership across organizations.
We are honored to expand Help Me Grow in King County and build a network of coordinated access partners. Help Me Grow King County strives to be a community-driven resource. We work towards the day when King County families can say, “Help Me Grow King County responds to our family, connecting us to what we need, when we need it, how we need it.“
Trusted community organizations play a key role in helping families navigate resources and seeing them through to a warm connection. This work supports successful connections to timely supports and improves access to high-quality, holistic developmental screenings.
Amara
Bella’s Creative Learning Center
Childhaven, Odessa Brown & Harborview
Children’s Therapy Center
Chinese Information and Service Center
Coalition for Refugees from Burma
Comunidad Latina de Vashon
Congolese Integration Network
El Centro de la Raza
Encompass
Families of Color Seattle
Federal Way Black Collective
Global Perinatal Services
HopeCentral
India Association of Western WA
InterCultural Children & Family Services
Living Well Kent
Mother Africa
Open Arms Perinatal Services
Open Doors for Multicultural Families
Perinatal Support WA
First Five Years & Beyond
Renton Innovation Zone Partnership
St. Vincent de Paul
United Indians of All Tribes Foundation
Voices of Tomorrow
West African Community Council
HIGHLIGHTS:
Comunidad Latina de Vashon:
Comunidad Latina de Vashon is a grassroots organization which amplifies community voice, activates families to self-advocate and shift systems to better serve Latino families. We are intentional in getting to know the families, to know their stories and the desires for their families and the larger Latino community. The Latino community on Vashon Island derives an ample amount of strength from their collective culture, their immense and thoughtful ideas and leadership. Thanks to BSK, Comunidad Latina de Vashon will continue to increase family connections and positive experiences for Latino families by developing effective, trustworthy and culturally aligned initiatives that are led by community brilliance.
Federal Way Black Collective:
FW Black Collective (FWBC) was formed in 2018 as a community resource by local community leaders. Our local black community was looking for a voice and an organization to collectively strategize to create change within the Federal Way area. We are driven by community requests and base our work off of the community-based surveys. We routinely host community meetings that engage with and/or collaborate with other community member organizations and host events that coincide with the advancement of the City of Federal Way. Our work is focused towards strengthening the black community, which is consistently overcoming marginalization. Our priorities in our community entail: quality and holistic childcare, providing culturally reflective educators, working on guaranteeing equity in city planning as well as, equitable access to resources; such as employment training, home ownership, and livable wage employment. We are the collective that provides a home for our community to build and strategize.
We want to bridge the gap by providing unconventional services; for example: childcare grants. These grants will help supplement the cost of culturally, reflective daycares for families from lower socio-economic backgrounds. This supplement would add a significant relief, that can reallocate funds to other living expenses such as, bills and groceries. Seeking strategic responses to combat these barriers is integral to our organization. The perspective we have when building out programming, is to be able to be as effective as possible and immediately have responses for frequent barriers that may arise for our community members. Our goal at FWBC is to provide services that are more impactful with strong community partners.
Congratulations on your awards! We are grateful for the essential services in early supports for children and families to thrive!