Fighting Childhood Poverty

Childhood and poverty and just two words that should never go together, kind of like cereal and orange juice. It just doesn’t mix well together. The unfortunate side is that many children are born into these poverty-based situations and have no choice or substantial knowledge to know that this cycle cannot continue. The cycle can stop with them, but the important part is that they need to know that before the baton is passed to them. What is interesting to note is that childhood poverty is something that is experienced throughout the world, not just here in the United States. So where exactly is the breakdown in providing for our children? Why are so many being born into this class?

CHIP is the childhood poverty research and policy center; their website is www.childhoodpoverty.org. They are comitted to reduce global poverty by partnering with China, India, Kyrgyzstan, and Mongolia. Three things I learned from reading through their website are that a true grasp on information regarding childhood poverty is lacking in all nations, the cause for childhood poverty varies greatly and that in order to move forward in the fight against poverty, change must be made that involves pro-poor, pro-child policy.

This proved interesting because in a country like China, with high educational and income levels, their level of childhood poverty is still quite high. So, it begs to answer the question-what is at the root of this epidemic? This is going to require some extensive research and time to enact policy changes and effective programs.

 

The National Black Child Development Institue

I chose to follow the National Black Child Development Institute, or NBCDI. I chose this organization because, as I stated in the post prior to this one, I have never heard of this particular organization and I wanted to learn more about their mission and what they do.

I haven’t received a newsletter yet but one thing that stood out to me on their website was the previous President and CEO and I share the same last name! Carol Brunson Day attended the President’s 2011 speech on education. Additionally, one thing that stood out to me was their annual conference. This is something I would be interested in attending and will make plans to do so this year. Their commitment to supporting our children resonates deeply with me and I am very interested in directly learning more about their mission.

 

Establishing connections

For this particular course, I have chosen to go with the alternative to part 1’s assignment of making contact with 2 early childhood professionals outside of the United States. The reason I chose the alternative is because over the course of my program here at Walden University and over the course of these past few months in which I started a new job, I have been experiencing learning curves in every sector of my life. One of these most recent curves came a few weeks ago when I received a promotion at my job in a charter school. This promotion involves more intensive work, serving the children of my school and I am proud to be in this position. However, with this promotion comes more time dedicated to my career and leaves a little bit less time for my graduate program. So, unfortunately I have to take the option that allows me to be successful and still progress in both areas of my life. So I will be listening to the podcasts and taking each assignment from that alternative.

I also chose to follow the National Black Child Development Institute. I chose this because it is an organization I have never heard of before, and in addition to my position at the school, I am also chair of the school’s Diversity committee. I have a strong passion and desire to see our young, minority youth succeed and so, any resource or outlet that is committed to that goal as well, is something I am interested in. I toyed between choosing this organization as opposed to the Harlem Children’s Zone. This dilemma arose because I am very familiar with the HCZ, being from NYC and being employed with a Charter School. But, those reasons are also exactly why I decided not to follow them. I want a challenge, I want to be presented with new information and be able to walk away from this course and this program, knowing something that I did not know before and never would have been exposed to, were it not for branching outside of my comfort zone.