Act Now!
The goal of Ready, Set, Grow Wisconsin is to promote public policies that create a foundation of excellence in early care and education that will lead to greater academic, economic and social success for all children. This foundation includes:
- Highly qualified teachers
- Small class sizes and small student teacher ratios
- Parent involvement in their children's education
- Program and curricula that helps kids succeed
- Facilities that ensure children's health and safety
To make sure every child in Wisconsin has access to high quality early education we need your help.
The Tree Project
Help us make trees with children's hand and/or footprints making the leaves. We'd like to have at least one for each legislator, delivered or mailed to their home office, and additional trees for an art display in the Capitol Rotunda on April 30, May 1 and 2. For the display, we will be framing the trees, so we ask that you use poster-sized paper 24" x 36".
Click here for a more detailed description of The Tree Project. This is a fun and easy activity to do with children. Don't forget to add your program's name and the names of the children who participated. You can make this an early literacy project by adding to it statements from the children about what they'd like to be when they grow up!
Parent Action Center: Postcard Campaign
Most everything you need to set up a Parent Action Center in your program is available for you to download from the WECA website. The idea is that you set up a postcard writing center in your child care program for parents and staff fill out postcards on-site and leave them with you to send back to WECA. We will then hand-deliver them to appropriate legislators during the Week of the Young Child.
The parent postcard should be copied on white (cardstock if at all possible) and children decorate the front of it, then parents sign and if they'd like, add a personal message of their own. Staff postcards are similar but should be copied onto colored cardstock, since they are not decorated by children. The postcards say "Early Learning Matters to Me," which is the theme of the Coalition's campaign Ready, Set Grow: Early Learning Matters.
To download the following information:
- A Letter to Directors (also read this to say "Family child care providers") explaining the project in more detail. Click here.
- A Parent Letter to go out to all parents 2 days before the Action Center is set up (during this time you decorate postcards with the children). English version , Spanish version
- Postcards to be copied; one for each child in care. Please copy on white cardstock and let the children be creative in making them colorful! Parents will sign and can add a personal message. English version, Spanish version
- Postcards to be copied; one for each staff person. Please copy on colored cardstock if possible and invite everyone who works in your program to sign and add a personal message.
English version, Spanish version
- A sign-up sheet inviting parents and staff to sign up to be part of a growing statewide network of people who support the Ready, Set Grow Campaign. Click here.
- "How To Set Up A Parent Action Center" pdf (printable) version of the instructions below.
Here are some photos of what the Action Center might look like. We recommend making a tabletop poster to give visibility to your Action Center, complete with pictures if you'd like and some suggestions for what parents might write in their message if they choose to add a personal message.
Here's what we suggest for supporting parents in writing their own message; this could be written up on your poster:
Write about:
- Your family and your need for quality child care
- Your search for child care
- How your child care program helps your family
- How your child care program helps your work life
- Why child care is important to you
- What your concerns are about child care
- What would make life easier for your family
Or simply make a statement, for example:
- I support full funding for the Wisconsin Shares Program
- I support a child care quality rating and improvement system
- I support funding for educational opportunities for my child's teacher or provider
- I support assistance to programs in meeting the needs of children with disabilities
All cards will be given the Legislature during the Week of the Young Child (April 22-28).
