Explanation
Mayor Ginther’s vision for Columbus, America’s Opportunity City, is that every child is ready for kindergarten. Addressing early childhood learning means bringing awareness and resources to a critical learning stage in childhood development. Children who come to school ready to learn are more likely to succeed academically and in life.
Children who participate in high-quality early childhood education experiences significantly improve their early literacy, language, and math skills. Ample evidence shows that children who enter school unprepared fall further and further behind. Students who get a poor start in their earliest years are likely to struggle in high school and, subsequently, fail to graduate.
In 2017, the Mayor convened the Hilltop Early Childhood Partnership to address the lack of quality early learning options in the Greater Hilltop Area. One of the recommendations of the Partnership was the development of a new early learning facility in the Hilltop to increase capacity. Design for the new facility is currently underway.
Developing an early learning center is not something the Department of Education, or the City itself, has ever done. The new facility will host numerous providers, each with different needs and operational goals. Therefore, developing a financially appropriate operating structure is crucial for the initiative’s success.
Because of this, the Department of Education is now requesting the authority to contract with Mollard Consulting to provide to the City a Facility Operations Analysis for the new facility. This analysis will answer key operations, management, and funding questions.
The Department is currently engaged with Mollard on a contract to operationalize programming needs for the new facility. And in 2019, the Department of Education contracted with Mollard Consulting to assist us in determining what wraparound programs and services were needed for Hilltop children to be successful.
Because of t...
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