Heartland Agency and the EvenStart Foundation are proud to work side by side to collaboratively provide needed programs for at-risk and developmentally delayed children. This partnership involves extensive supports to children and their families, aimed at reversing the effects of early adverse childhood experiences.
EvenStart Program Details
Through a comprehensive three-year educational and therapeutic program, the EvenStart Program aspires:
- To reverse a child’s developmental delays from an average of 70-90% to within 5% of childhood norms
- To build children’s resiliency and coping skills to better manage at-risk environments
- To enable preschool children to enter Grade 1 on an equal footing with their peers
- To provide family parenting and resource supports
- To reverse or eliminate the effects of cyclical poverty on a child’s promise and potential for school and life success
We do this by providing:
- A safe place to be…a place that is predictable, that establishes boundaries, and where the most important work we do is form a relationship with each child. Through these relationships, a child feels safe enough to learn a new way “to be.”
- At least one staff member to every four children
- Speech therapy, occupational therapy, play therapy and behavioural support to assist children with closing their developmental lags and heal their emotional wounds
- Door-to-door transportation to and from our program, because the majority of our families do not have vehicles
- An abundance of food, because we know many of our children come to school hungry
- Support and training to parents in their homes to assist in carrying over the child’s learning