Tag: Best Starts for Kids

Convening with peers in the youth development field is one of the many benefits grantees in the Best Starts for Kids (BSK) Expanded Learning Initiative have. This voter-funded initiative administered by School’s Out Washington (SOWA) provides youth organizations in King County with funding, quality improvement, and professional development supports.   Due to resource constraints such as time and funding, youth providers often find themselves isolated, making it easy to forget that so many other providers are grappling with similar questions and challenges. Additionally, building partnerships requires significant time, effort, and interconnectedness that many programs don’t have capacity for—making convenings like BSK Learning Community Meetings (LCMs) an invaluable opportunity for grantees.   LCMs are designed to give BSK grantees that rare chance to connect, share, and learn from and with each other. While SOWA hosts smaller cohort-based LCMs throughout the year, the annual spring All-BSK LCM brings … [ ]

The School’s Out Washington (SOWA) office was full of discussion, laughter, and the sounds of Beyonce’s latest hit, “Texas Hold ‘Em,” on Thursday, March 7, for the Best Starts for Kids (BSK) Initiative’s first initiative-wide Learning Community Meeting (LCM).   “The LCM was a fun and great opportunity to connect with peers who are passionate about youth work and are willing to discover and talk about ways to advocate and uplift our youth,” shared Yesenia Beltran, Targeted Academic and Behavior Support for BSK grantees Dick Scobee Elementary and Cascade Middle School.   LCMs are cohort-based peer learning opportunities where all members of … [ ]

Kids and Paper was born out of the experience of love, change, and a mother noticing her child’s irrepressible self-expression through drawing. Now, Kids and Paper have provided 200 children with a program where they are encouraged to safely and freely express themselves through art, play, academics, and more in a warm, creative, family-oriented environment.     Azadeh Eslamy, Executive Director of Kids and Paper, was running youth programming in Lebanon when the country experienced economic collapse, leading to her family’s evacuation to the United States, where they settled in Seattle. As they adjusted to the city, one of Azadeh’s children became … [ ]