Exploring Roles in the Early Childhood Community at Local and State levels

An organization I have been following for years and have been recommending to parents is the Dr. Yum Project. The mission of this group is to transform the lives of families and communities by provide an understanding of the connection between foods and overall health, as well as empowering them with the tools to live a healthy life.

It all started with a pediatrician in our local office who was concerned with the obesity rates. She started a website with recipes that were created and tested by children, and has now grown into a physical kitchen where classes are taught to children, gardens are grown and cared for by children, and nutrition information is exchanged with families and each other. By involving the children in their own choices, there is a better rate of success trying and enjoying new healthy foods and an awareness of how to make proper choices to live a healthy life.

This organization's mission is to champion for public policies that will improve the lives of Virginia's children. They combine statistics and indicators of children's well being with current research to determine unmet needs and threats to children's health and safety, then recommend policy solutions to policy makers and educate community leaders and concerned citizens to support these solutions.
I find this organization to be well organized, factual, and strong advocates for young children and their families. Their accomplishments include reestablishing funding for home care visits, increased funding for early intervention of children with developmental delays, safety improvements to early child care system, and increasing attendance for pre-k in lower income families.
The Rappahannock Area Community Services Board is formed to improve the quality of life for people in the district that suffer from mental illness, intellectual disability, and substance abuse through responsive care to individual needs. I have been involved with this organization for the past 3 years, and would look to be an area of service for their attendees.

The first two organizations are strictly volunteer, but the last, the RACSB, offers job opportunities as care givers in the residences, and as house managers. I was interested in either of these positions as a second job, but my primary job did not allow the scheduling to work; I have been involved as a volunteer on and off for 3 years and find the interaction among different abilities to be helpful social skill builders.