Early Childhood Education Facts

United Way of Greater Cleveland invests $1,003,160 in early childhood education programs to serve low-income children and their families.

Why it’s important:
The Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland found that for every $1 invested in high-quality early learning programs in Ohio, $1.62 would be returned to the public (Belfield, 2005).

Young children exposed to high-quality early education exhibit better language, mathematics, cognitive and social skills, as well as have better relationships with classmates than do children in lower-quality care (Education Week, 2002).

Students who attend quality early education programs are 40 percent less likely to need special education or be held back a grade and are 70 percent less likely to commit a violent crime by age 18. These children also had greater lifetime earnings and reduced dependence on welfare. These all translate into a 12 percent public rate of return on investment for the state (Rolnick & Grunewald, 2003).

United Way’s early care and education investment strategies are designed to provide:

• High quality early childhood education programs to serve children in Cleveland and the inner ring suburbs.
• Evidence-based home visitation programs that provide child development information, referrals and support that value the parent as the primary teacher, serving children in Cleveland and inner ring suburban communities.
• Community supports that provide low-income families with child care referrals and assistance with child care placement.
• Programs that provide professional development to improve the quality of early care and education providers.

A special Early Childhood Education program
United Way also supports “Supporting Partnerships to Assure Ready Kids” (SPARK), a special project that has proven to help kids score higher on the state’s kindergarten readiness assessment test as well as positively influence future academic performance in collaboration with Cuyahoga County’s Invest in Children initiative and the Literacy Cooperative of Greater Cleveland. It focuses on helping children ages 3 and 4 years old become kindergarten ready. This program has shown significant results in improving kindergarten readiness among low-income children in other communities nationally. The local project works with families with 3 and 4-year-old children in the Cleveland Heights/University Heights and Maple Heights school districts.

What United Way is Doing
United Way of Greater Cleveland early childhood programs helped 3,943 families in the last measured 18-month funding period in the following locations:

• Achievement Centers for Children Services offered in the Highland Hills location. Families bring their children for specialized services.
• Center for Families and Children Services offered in the following five locations:
  - Bingham Early Learning Center, 2421 Central Avenue, Cleveland (Central neighborhood)
  - Mather Early Learning Center, 9204 Union Avenue, Cleveland (Union Miles neighborhood)
  - McMillian Early Learning Center, 1941 South Taylor Road, Cleveland Heights
  - Rainbow Terrace Early Learning Center and Early Head Start, 7255 Garden Valley, Cleveland
   (Kinsman neighborhood…surrounded by CMHA’s Garden Valley Estates)
  - Wade Early Learning Center, 9111 Yale Avenue, Cleveland (Glenville neighborhood)
• Early Childhood Enrichment Center Services offered in the Shaker Family Center building, serving primarily the Shaker Heights and Cleveland neighborhoods. Children are diverse socially, economically, religiously and racially.
• Karamu House, Inc. Services offered in the Quincy Place location. (Fairfax neighborhood
• Lexington-Bell Community Center Services offered in the Hough neighborhood.
• Merrick House Services offered in the near west side ethnically diverse Tremont neighborhood.
• University Settlement, Inc. Services offered in the Broadway/Slavic Village neighborhood.
• West Side Ecumenical Ministry Services offered in the following five near west side centers:
  - 2800 Archwood Avenue, Cleveland
  - 12601 Detroit Avenue, Lakewood
  - 3288 West 58th Street, Cleveland
  - 5209 Detroit Avenue, Cleveland
  - West 98th Street and Madison Avenue, Cleveland
• YMCA of Greater Cleveland Services offered in Lakewood United Methodist Church and
  the Cleveland State University Child Development Center.