Invest in Kids

The incredible years (iy) is a suite of proven prevention programs that increase a child's success at school and at home by promoting positive relationships. The program's goal is to improve school performance, reduce child behavior problems, promote positive and consistent discipline, and support caregivers through a holistic approach involving children, parents, and teachers. This evidence-based program is made up of three distinct components that work together to achieve outstanding outcomes: preschool basic parent program (parent program; strengthens positive parenting skills); dinosaur school (skill building for children, taught in classrooms); and teacher classroom management (professional development training for teachers and staff; tcm). During the 2022-2023 program year services were offered across 22 counties in Colorado with the support of Invest in Kids. - dinosaur school numbers served: 426 teachers and educational staff supported the delivery of dinosaur school to 5,737 students. - teacher classroom management (tcm): served 60 teachers and educational staff, supporting 537 students. - parent program numbers served: 75 parent program facilitators delivered parent program to 474 parents across 47 unique parent groups in Colorado.

Child first (cf) is an evidence-based, two-generation, home based, early childhood model that helps families build strong, nurturing relationships that heal and protect young children from the devastating impact of trauma and chronic stress. Child first is the only psychotherapeutic intervention in the home visiting sector qualifying for federal maternal, infant & early childhood home visiting funding. As a home-based intervention model that works with the caregiver and child, child first is delivered by a two?person team consisting of a mental health clinician with experience in early childhood development and a family support partner, who works with the family on the sources of stress that impact their family and connects the family to community resources. The program is unique because it combines two complementary approaches to healing from trauma and adversity: it directly decreases the stressors experienced by the family through connecting them to needed services and supports and it facilitates a nurturing, responsive caregiver-child relationship. Research has demonstrated that this approach protects the young developing brain and metabolic systems from the damaging effects of high stress environments such as poverty, homelessness and domestic violence. Child first is now being delivered by six local affiliate agencies and as of summer 2023 available in 25 Colorado counties. in the 2022-2023 program year, child first served 245 children and 284 of their caregivers. Of those children and caregivers, 68% of children and families met their treatment goals and 88% of families showed improvement in at least one practice domain (including child's language development, caregiver-child interactions, parental depression, family adversity, child's problematic behaviors, parental stress, child's social skills and development).

Nurse-family partnership (nfp) nurse-family partnership is an evidenced- based community health program where nurses partner with families facing overlapping health, social, and economic barriers. Colorado nfp is sustained by staff from 22 implementing agencies consisting of county public health departments, federally qualified health centers, hospitals, non-profits and a college of nursing. Iik intensively supports the nursing staff at these implementing agencies to ensure the high-quality delivery of the program with fidelity to the nfp model. Invest in Kids guides communities to achieve high quality implementation through nursing leadership, individualized consultation, the use of data to inform program implementation and nursing practice, facilitation of statewide meetings to foster partnership and knowledge sharing, and strategic support that meets the unique needs of the nursing workforce. in Colorado, fy 22-23 data shows 4,023 clients served and 3,335 children served in the program. Outcomes include: - 90% of babies were born full term - 87% of babies were born at a healthy weight - 88% of clients were screened for depression during pregnancy - 95% of clients initiated breastfeeding - research shows that enrolling 1,000 low-income families in nfp in Colorado prevents 45 preterm births, 253 child maltreatment incidents, 303 violent crimes by youth, and 3 infant deaths.