As we pursue opportunity for every child, in every state, we acknowledge that racism exists and creates unfair obstacles for children and families of color.
For example:
At the Alliance for Early Success, we know the only way we will achieve our vision is through policy changes that disrupt the systems and practices that cause racial disparities, starting at the very early stages of life.
Allies for Antiracism is our commitment to seeing and addressing racial inequality in our strategic planning and in the 50-state network we support to fulfill our mission.
Our Allies for Antiracism initiative has three pillars:
We will continually name the unfairness that hinders opportunities to succeed for many of our nation’s traditionally marginalized children and families.
We will continually learn and self-assess as professionals and as an organization.
We will continually collaborate with state allies and the national organizations that support their work to hear where they are and what they need, and will follow through with technical efforts to help them pursue policies that dismantle racism and undo racial disparities.
The Alliance’s racial equity work includes:
Operationalizing Equity, a program for our grantees launched in 2021 that funds and supports their work to be more equitable in their advocacy and operations.
Hosting national voices on equity in policy advocacy as part of our National Issues > State Action webinar series.
Advancing the disaggregation of racial data in the analysis of early childhood and family support policy.
Naming unfair systems and equitable practices explicitly in our Theory of Change.
Establishing new grant projects and programs to support states in their efforts to build coalitions and hear voices with lived experience.
Several communities of practice that equip participants to strengthen their organization’s ability to center proximate voices and work with their communities in more trauma-informed, non-extractive ways.
More news on advancing equity from the Alliance and our network:
The Alliance and the National Indian Health Board offer an overview of the Indian health system, with a focus on how federal Indian law, tribal sovereignty, and the government’s trust responsibility shape access to care for Native mothers, infants, and young children.
In partnership with Salish Kootenai College, other tribal colleges, and the National American Indian/ Alaska Native Head Start Collaboration Office, Zero to Five Montana helped to launch an Early Childhood Tribal Language Summit in 2019 and recently formed a statewide Early Childhood Tribal Coalition.
As part of our celebration of this year’s Black Maternal Health Week (April 11-17), the Alliance is spotlighting a few of the maternal health organizations that you may not have heard about. The Beloved Early Education and Care Collective (BEE Collective) works in the southern part of South Carolina, outside of Charleston, and is focused on building on the assets of the pregnant people, children, and caregivers who are furthest from opportunity — work that creates the kind of deep community that heals itself and builds increasing power.
As part of our celebration of this year’s Black Maternal Health Week (April 11-17), the Alliance is spotlighting I Be Black Girl, a maternal health organization that focuses on policy and power building, Black-led investments, birth justice, and economic justice.
In honor of Black Maternal Health Week 2025 (#BMHW25), the Alliance for Early Success and the Michigan Council for Maternal and Child Health (MCMCH) are co-hosting a webinar on engaging community voice and partnerships to enhance maternal health. Learn about community-informed research and policymaking to support Black maternal health in Michigan.
Early childhood and reproductive justice advocates share a vision that parents nurture their children in safe and healthy environments. Both movements value family decision-making, community knowledge and leadership, and policy change. Together, early childhood and reproductive justice advocates can create a world in which maternal and child health are optimized and families with young children live in thriving communities. This webinar explores the history and origins of the reproductive justice movement, reviews of the structural and systemic policy impacts on Prenatal-to-3, and names the mutual values and priorities shared with early childhood advocates.
Each year, the Alliance for Early Success surveys early childhood policy advocates representing all 50 states and the District of Columbia to create its annual 50-State Early Childhood Policy Progress and Landscape Report. The 2024 report, released in January, shows that support for state early childhood policies and funding continued to be strong, with policymakers from every region and political landscape acting to improve their early childhood policies.
It is no secret that early childhood educators face challenges in Wisconsin and beyond, and yet plans to make the system more equitable are often missing the voices of these practitioners themselves. In Wisconsin, a new study that centers the voices of Wisconsin early educators from traditionally marginalized groups is already having an impact on policy in the state.
The Alliance Hosts 200 grantees for three days of reflection, discussion, and connecting insights to their work as individuals, leaders, and early childhood
advocates.
