News

SYRACUSE, NEW YORK, June 2018 – The Parent-Child Home Program (PCHP) National Center is pleased to announce the launch of its first site in Syracuse, New York. Thanks to generous support from the Allyn Family Foundation, MAEVA Social Capital, and a multi-year grant through the Early Childhood Alliance (ECA) from the Alliance for Economic Inclusion’s anti-poverty grants, PCHP has partnered with Catholic Charities of Onondaga County to bring its evidence-based Program to low-income families in the city of Syracuse and Onondaga County. With these strong partnerships in place, Catholic Charities is starting home visits this month. In its first year, the Catholic Charities PCHP site will work with at least 50 families with the goal of doubling in size in the next year.

On June 19, County Executive Joanie Mahoney, will host a kickoff event with Sarah Walzer, national PCHP CEO, and Eva and Harry Wilson of MAEVA Social Capital at the CNY Philanthropy Center Ballroom. Highlighting the ECA’s support for this initiative, Director Laurie Black noted “Parent-Child Home Program is a core strategy of the Early Childhood Alliance’s efforts to ensure more children enter school ready to be successful students.”

Through PCHP, community based early learning specialists work with families, in their homes, helping parents with children ages two to four who do not have access to quality early childhood programming, build language and learning rich home environments. The Program enhances children’s literacy, cognitive, and social emotional skills, preparing them for school and supporting their transition to pre-k. PCHP was selected after an in-depth needs assessment by the Early Childhood Alliance which revealed “a troubling gap. After a child’s second birthday, the number of home visiting programs operating in Onondaga County plummeted,” notes Bethany Creaser, Director of Educational Services at Catholic Charities, “The only available home visiting program for parents with children over two necessitates a referral from welfare services.”

Eva and Harry Wilson, the founders of MAEVA Social Capital, remarked, “We focus on working with and investing in nonprofits with demonstrated success in closing the achievement gap and helping those nonprofits expand and grow. PCHP is one of the best and most effective nonprofits we have found, and it is a great joy to help them open in Syracuse and work to close the achievement gap in Onondaga County.”

With over 50 years of proven outcomes, PCHP has documented important longitudinal impacts for program participants: graduates enter school as well or better prepared than their classmates, perform significantly better than their socioeconomic peers and as well as or better than the overall population on school readiness measures, and are reading and doing math on grade level in third grade. They are 50 percent less likely to be referred to special education services by the third grade; and they graduate from high school at the rate of middle class children nationally – a 30 percent higher rate than their socio-economic peers.

As Kara Williams, the Director of Strategic Initiatives at the Allyn Family Foundation observed, “We knew pretty quickly that Parent Child Home Program was a good fit. The equity and social justice framing really appealed to us – the program prioritizes recruiting staff from within the community, and they’re known for employing graduates of the program.”

Media Contact:
Courtney Inman, PCHP Development & Events Director
Phone: 516.883.7481 Email: cinman@parent-child.org

About Parent-Child Home Program

The Parent-Child Home Program’s (PCHP) international network of program sites provides under-resourced families with the necessary tools to ensure their children achieve their greatest potential in school and in life. Since 1965, PCHP has been assisting underserved communities in replicating and expanding this proven school readiness program that builds early parent-child verbal interaction and learning at home. Through twice-weekly visits by highly trained community-based early learning specialists, PCHP provides families the skills, materials (books and educational toys), and support to help parents engage and teach their children. Over 50 years of research shows that the Program effectively increases school readiness, decreases the need for special education services before grade three by 50%, and increases participants’ high school graduation rates by over 30% to the same level as their middle-income peers. For more information please go to www.parent-child.org.