Construction of Educare of West DuPage, a $10 million, state-of-the-art early childhood school will begin with a groundbreaking ceremony April 21. Among the local leaders and Educare supporters attending the ceremony are Roger Hughes of the Gustafson Family Foundation, Ed Leman, superintendent of West Chicago Elementary School District 33, and West Chicago Mayor Mike Kwasman.
Educare of West DuPage will provide high-quality early childhood education aimed at narrowing the achievement gap for low-income children in West Chicago. Funded by public and private donors, Educare of West DuPage will serve 150 infants, toddlers, preschoolers and their families when it opens in 2012.
Educare will be built across the park from Pioneer School, the elementary school with the highest percentage of low-income students in DuPage County. Over the past decade, the number of children age five and under living in poverty in DuPage County has doubled to more than 5,000.
"Without high-quality early education, low-income children are more likely to enter kindergarten unprepared, to struggle throughout their school years, and to drop out of school," said Theresa Hawley, chair of Educare of West DuPage's board of directors. "Educare of West DuPage will help level the playing field and increase educational attainment. That's a good thing for DuPage County because it will ensure a more productive and qualified workforce in the future."
The 24,000-square-foot facility will be LEED certified. In addition to classrooms, Educare will house a library and resource center for parents, community meeting space, and a training center for early childhood professionals from the western suburbs.
Educare programming is grounded in research‐based strategies for narrowing the achievement gap. Each school provides high staff/child ratios to support individualized attention (three teachers in classrooms with eight infants and toddlers; three teachers in classrooms of 17 preschool‐aged children); high staff credentials (master's‐degreed supervising teachers, lead teachers in each classroom with bachelor's degrees, master's‐degreed family support supervisors, etc.); an intensive focus on social‐emotional development and early language development; and a commitment to rigorous, ongoing program evaluation and improvement.
"Educare of West DuPage is a great example of the community coming together to do the right thing for young children and families," said Al Gustafson, president of the Gustafson Family Foundation. "Research clearly shows that high-quality early childhood programs can narrow the achievement gap and prevent the need for costly interventions later in life."
The Gustafson Family Foundation and The Children's Initiative, a project of the J.B. and M.K. Pritzker Family Foundation, are anchor funders of the Educare school. Other funders include the "Illinois Jobs Now!" capital plan, Educare Network, LLC, and the Educare Replication Pool, supported by the Buffett Early Childhood Fund, the W.K. Kellogg Foundation, the George Kaiser Family Foundation, the Irving Harris Foundation and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. The private donors and a state capital grant are paying for the construction of the facility and a combination of local, state and federal public education dollars will support day‐to‐day operations.
Educare of West DuPage joins a growing network of 12 operating Educare schools across the nation that are showing dramatic results. An independent evaluation found that children who enroll in Educare between birth and age two enter kindergarten better prepared than the national average for all children. Educare children also scored better on measures of vocabulary and social skills than most low‐income children—both of which are strong predictors of future success in school.
The first Educare school opened in 2000 on Chicago's South Side through an innovative partnership between the Irving Harris Foundation and the Ounce of Prevention Fund, a nonprofit organization committed to quality early childhood education programs, policies and research. Soon after the opening, the Ounce and the Omaha-based Buffett Early Childhood Fund joined forces to work with local public and private partners across America to create the Educare network.
Educare of West DuPage is the first suburban Educare school. The 12 operating Educare schools are in Chicago; Milwaukee; Denver; Miami; Oklahoma City; Seattle; Kansas City, Kan.; and Waterville, Maine, and there are two Educare schools each in Omaha, Neb., and Tulsa, Okla. Two Educare schools are under construction—in Phoenix and in Washington, DC—and more are under development.
Educare schools draw on all available resources—Head Start and Early Head Start, local schools, child care, private support, and more—to implement highly effective birth‐to‐age-five learning environments for at‐risk children and families. Educare schools often are built adjacent to an elementary school to send the message that the first five years of life are the first five years of learning, and to reinforce more powerful connections with K‐12 public education.
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