UPSTREAM INITIATIVE: A Focus on the First 1000 Days
The first effort of The Collaborative is the Upstream Initiative: A Focus on the First 1000 Days. We know that the first 1000 days of a child's life sets the foundation for all the years to come, so we are strategically focusing on this most critical time of a child's development.
The chronic stress of racism and poverty, and the opportunity gaps that exist based on zip code, are persistent patterns that need to be addressed. All of our best efforts have not fixed these systemic issues.
There are many organizations doing incredible work to improve health and education outcomes for children, yet the gaps in access and outcomes persist. We continue to have children and their families wandering through a fragmented system, trying to piece together the supports that exist, and often falling through the cracks.
Something needs to change. Intergenerational patterns will continue until we change our approaches to these issues.
The Upstream Initiative is not a new program. It is a locally-designed and culturally-responsive co-imagination of a new system. There are many innovative programs in Oregon that are working to help children and families succeed. Yet, the gaps continue to widen in health and education outcomes. In partnership with the agencies and organizations that provide critical services, The Collaborative will support a re-imagining of how programs interface to deliver care.
The Upstream Initiative will build community among leaders and organizations to collaborate on solutions and generate a Child Success Model (CSM). The Collaborative will select four design pilots from across the state of Oregon, and operate a parallel learning collaborative for these design pilots. Together they will imagine a blue sky or moon shot vision to design a blueprint for a CSM.
We are asking:
If anything were possible, what would it take to ensure that every child, family and community has an equitable opportunity to succeed?
After these design pilots co-create a blueprint, we will work together to replicate this statewide through legislation.
The outcome of these design pilots and learning collaborative will be a blueprint for Child Success Models (CSM) that will ensure services, supports, interventions and protective factors reach each child during the first 1000 days of life, prepare children and families to successfully enter the education system and then provide community support to ensure educational and health needs are met.
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Identify & support four community-based design pilots to co-create the blueprint for a Child Success Model.
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Create a learning collaborative to elevate and amplify the work of the design pilots.
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Use the design pilots and learning collaborative for legislative proposals to begin to scale the Child Success Model across the state.
The big outcome will be a disruption to cycles of intergenerational adverse experiences and equitable positive outcomes in Health and Education for ALL Oregon’s children.
UPSTREAM INITIATIVE
Click here to download The Collaborative’s Upstream Initiative PDF Document