Program areas at EDCI
Family advocates: the advocate program is designed to help early childhood, middle school and high school students develope critical academic and social skills necessary for school success. Dci offers a variety of social, emotional, and cognitive development services for families with children ages 0-5, including dci early childhood parent advocates, childcare subsidies, kindergarten readiness programs, and home visiting programs.
Early childhood action plan: as the backbone organization, dci coordinated and led a collective partnership among 150 parents/caregivers, early childhood providers, community leaders and institutional leaders to become the first county in north carolina to create an ecap specific to our community. "grown in Durham: Durham's early childhood action plan" now serves as a blueprint for strengthening the early childhood system in Durham.
Preschool: dci operates a low-cost, half-day, bilingual preschool (dci preschool academy). In fy23, enrollment averaged 15 children. 63% of tested rising kindergarteners left the dci preschool academy ready for success in kindergarten and beyond, as measured by the kindergarten observation form.
Dci middle years and young adult family advocates facilitate the parent-teacher-school connection for families, with a strong focus on empowering parents to become effective advocates for their Children's educational success. A family youth advocate assesses the needs of youth and families, and develops a personal plan and goals based on their needs. A family youth advocate connects students and families to community resources, programs, partners and services to ensure youth are engaged and parents have knowledge of strategies to ensure student success. In fy23, dci served over 700 children/young adults from 333 families enrolled in the advocate program with 7 dci family advocates working alongside families to connect them to community resources, provide behavioral and educational supports, and create positive home environments. Early childhood: dci offers a variety of social, emotional, and cognitive development services for families with children ages 0-5, including advocates; childcare subsidies; kindergarten readiness programs; and home visiting programs. Analyses utilizing data from the nc education research data center indicates a robust positive relationship between the total number of ec programs and involvement with an advocate prior to school entry and performance on k-2 literacy assessments (dibels composite proficiency; and text reading comprehension proficiency).holiday zone activities provided wrapped toys for children who participate in the family advocacy program.basic needs support: continuing the basic needs efforts that began during the pandemic, dci focused on distributing items such as food and diapers. Through partnerships, donations, and third party agencies, dci initiated distribution of these items to families on a regular, routine basis. During food distribution we have provided/distributed over 1000 meals/packaged food and diapers.community and summer programs: dci's community and summer programs include english as a second language classes, and a variety of summer and spring break camps. Dci also offers year-round out-of-school learning programs to students in grades k-8 in partnership with various education providers throughout the triangle. In fy23 we served 50 youth in the ymca camps through the slots purchased by dci for the program participants. Other activities included tutoring services and story hour, which provides literacy interventions for children and families living in the dci zone. Our academic coaching programming served approximately 30 students in grades k-12.workforce development: the manager of workforce development along with family advocates identified youth ages 14+ for the summer workforce development program. This program had over 25 participants. They received support on job and workforce skills training over a six week period.partnership development related to building relationships with organizations providing a program or service as part of the dci pipeline, for example medical providers, Durham county department of social services, united way collaborative, health department, book harvest, etc.