Early Head Start joins MATURA ranks

MATURA in Creston is helping a new group of people thanks to an award from the federal Head Start office.

The Head Start preschool program, currently residing alongside the CCSD’s Early Childhood Center on North Elm Street, welcomes 98 children from ages 3 to 5.

According to the Iowa Department of Education website, “Head Start is accessible at no cost to children ... for low-income families. [The organization is] federally funded and locally operated.”

Creston MATURA Director Joel Lamb said his office had been working for years to get an Early Head Start program. Early Head Start serves children under the age of 3.

“The lack of quality childcare is not just a problem in our region or in the state of Iowa, but nationwide. This project has been many years in the making,” Lamb said. “The folks who sit on the board at Greater Connections actually were instrumental in helping to plan this process and to really build that center with Early Head Start standards in mind.”

Lamb said previous director Julie Lang had been working to get Early Head Start in Creston for quite a while.

“This was kind of her idea for I want to say around 20 years,” Lamb said.” I know she had applied several times to the office of Head Start, and I think all the funds that were made available were given to programs that already had Early Head Start.”

Creston MATURA was officially awarded eight Early Head Start positions from the federal office this year. This award is renewable for five years, and Lamb said a new version will likely be available after.

“The federal award that we received was a conversion of some of our federal Head Start slots to some of our federally funded Early Head Start slots,” Lamb said. “Now, we actually have eight early head start slots that are going to be served through a partnership with Greater Connections here in Creston.”

Early Head Start services started Monday, with the eight positions filling in alongside other children at Greater Connections Childcare Center. Since the Greater Connections board has been working with MATURA before the childcare center was built, not many changes have to be made to fulfill Early Head Start standards.

“We provide the service of the creative curriculum, which we are currently already doing. We’ve had all our infant through toddler staff trained,” Greater Connections Director Melissa Zellmer said. “What that also does is, we increase our staff. In the Early Head Start rooms, it’s always 1-to-4 [staff to children]. Our infants are currently 1-to-4, but our toddlers are 1-to-6, so we have extra staff in those Early Head Start rooms.”

Though there are only eight Early Head Start slots now, the goal is to get more in the future.

“To be an Early Head Start program, the lead teacher in that room has to have their Child Development Associates. We currently have six teachers here with their CDA, and two more are getting that,” Zellmer said. “Hopefully in the future, we will be able to have more Early Head Start slots and meet more families that need it.”

MATURA is also working toward getting more Early Head Start slots, specifically with the addition of a new Early Head Start mentor coach.

“We were awarded a grant through the Iowa Department of Education,” Lamb said. “The general goal of that is to build partnerships with childcare centers in our area, so daycares, in order to assist them to increase their quality up to the point where they can meet or exceed Head Start or Early Head Start standards. The [mentor coach] would be the tip of the spear in terms of making those connections.”

As MATURA works to further the Early Head Start program in Creston, Lamb encourages the community to come forward if services are needed.

“We think we probably have already more interested and qualified families than can be served with those initial eight slots,” Lamb said. “However, the goal is to show that the need exists in the community so we can petition the federal government for additional funds for additional slots in the future. Part of that is showing that there is a greater need in the community than we can serve with this initial award, so it’s kind of a building block process.”

Creston MATURA Head Start can be reached at (641) 782-8002 or alarson@maturaia.org. Greater Connections Childcare Center can be reached at (641) 782-7117.