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Kindergarten-readiness program SPARKs success in Youngstown
By Denise Dick
Youngstown
City school children participating in a kindergarten readiness program scored better on literacy assessments than their classmates.
SPARK, Supporting Partnerships to Assure Ready Kids, operated by D&E Counseling Center and funded by the Raymond John Wean Foundation, enrolled 26 students who entered kindergarten at Taft or Williamson Elementary schools in fall 2011.
Gregory Cvetkovic, D&E’s executive director, said the program is not only to prepare children but to help parents to help their children in school.
“It helps them learn how they can become their child’s first and best teacher,” he said. “Parents are sometimes the most important teacher.”
The program focuses on literacy. Parent partners visit homes of students who will be in kindergarten the following year. They bring books and other learning materials and work with the children as well as inform parents of how they can help in between the visits.
Peter Leahy, from the University of Akron’s Institute for Health and Social Policy, conducted a study that determined the program is working.
Of the 26 enrolled, 15 received at least eight visits which is the minimum necessary to say the child was enrolled in SPARK.
Results indicate that parents showed improvement in areas addressed by SPARK.
“SPARK is doing here what we want it to do,” Leahy said.
The program has expanded to Campbell in its second year with 73 children who will attend the two city schools and Campbell Elementary now participating in the program. Already, 59 families have signed up for the following year.
Cherry Robinson’s son, Sir, is in kindergarten at Williamson after a year in SPARK. She said she initially didn’t think her son needed the program, but Celestine Mayo, one of the parent partners, convinced her.
Her son enjoyed it, and both she and he tell others about the program, encouraging them to enroll. “I saw the effectiveness of the program,” Robinson said.