Join COO at the second annual Best Starts for Kids Virtual Summit: We Build. We Rise. We Soar!
Join us for the 2nd Annual Best Starts Summit: We build. We rise. We soar. April 27-30 with Special Preview Day April 26.
The upcoming Best Starts for Kids annual summit offers an opportunity to share your experiences and reflect on the challenges we’ve faced and overcome this past year.
Summit Keynote Speakers include:
Sheila Capestany, Strategic Advisor for Children and Youth, will kick the Best Starts for Kids summit off with an official welcome
King County Executive Dow Constantine, the driving force behind Best Starts for Kids since the initiative’s inception in 2015
Olu Dixon, an inspirational youth speakerand accomplished youth actor, dancer, and entrepreneur currently studying at the Baltimore School for the Arts
Rashad Norris, a Equity, Diversity, Inclusion, and Injustice Consultant with over 15 years of experience engaging with Black and Brown youth, young men of color, and incarcerated youth
Registration: Free online registration is now open. Attendees can choose one or all of the workshops and summit events.
More information: Read about keynote speakers and 20 breakout sessions on the Best Starts for Kids blog
Communities of Opportunity initiative staff and partners will be featured in several breakout sessions:
Best Starts for Kids Listening Session - Monday, April 26, @ 4PM
Let’s talk about Best Starts for Kids! We’d like to share with you what we thought we heard from our communities about Best Starts 2.0. We’d like to hear from you: did we get it right? Share your wisdom and thoughts on what implementation for Best Starts 2.0 should look like if passed by the voters in August of 2021.
Shifting Systems – A Best Starts-COO & HSE Response to COVID-19 – Tuesday, April 27 @ 1pm
One year into the COVID-19 pandemic the health, social, and economic impacts of the crisis are still being felt across King County, with low-income households and communities of color experiencing the greatest harm. The pandemic has exacerbated existing systemic barriers to health and well-being that have led to inequities by race and place. Best Starts and COO/HSE community partners were able to pivot quickly to respond to the increased needs of King County residents and in this session participants will learn how Best Starts and COO/HSE were able to shift investments to support partners in the pandemic, as they moved to support community. At the same time, community groups are working to ensure that equity is built into COVID-19 response and recovery so that our region emerges from the pandemic with policies and systems that support equity and community health. Partners will also share about their experiences responding to systemic challenges that resulted from and were exacerbated by the COVID-19 pandemic and how their communities have responded with resilience to mitigate and address these challenges. Featuring Adriana Ortiz, Sensitive Locations Project Coordinator at El Centro de la Raza; Andrea Akita, Director of Communities of Opportunity; A.J. McClure, Executive Director of Global to Local; Cynthia Ramos, Lead Community Organizer at Comunidad Latina de Vashon; Cristina Gonzalez, Program Manager Communities of Opportunity.
We are the Rainier Valley: How Four Coalitions are Fighting Displacement – Tuesday, April 27 @ 4pm
Join us for the launch of the Rainier Valley Communities of Opportunity (RVCOO) partnership's We are the Rainier Valley video. We are thrilled to present this 10-minute video describing how local community-based organizations are combating displacement and hyper-gentrification in Southeast Seattle.
We are the Rainier Valley features our development and community-based engagement projects. The RVCOO partnership consists of four coalitions: On Board Othello, Multicultural Communities Coalition, Rainier Beach Action Coalition, and South Communities Organizing for Racial & Regional Equity; altogether, we represent more than 40 community-based organizations and non-profits.
Our partnership also receives support from HomeSight and Puget Sound Sage, both funded RVCOO partners invested in RVCOO projects' success. After the video, you will hear from a few partners who will briefly discuss highlights from the first quarter of 2021 and our plans moving forward.Racism as a Public Health Crisis: What is the Role of Data? Wednesday, April 28 @ 2:30pm
In 2020, Public Health-Seattle & King County acknowledged what many have long known: racism is a crisis that impacts the health and wellbeing of our communities. We’ll host a dialogue about the role of data in naming racism as a public health crisis and how data can be used to address the crisis. Join us to share your thoughts on:
• How can we change the legacy of data being used “against” communities?
• How can data be used to address racism?
• What additional data, tools, or resources do you wish you had to address the impacts of racism? How can we change current data practices to meet these needs?
Discussion will be hosted by Communities Count. We’ll share a presentation that spotlights local inequities and examples of underlying systems and policies that contribute to them before moving into dialogue.Equity In Action: Don’t Just Talk About It, Be About It-Transforming Your Organizational Culture! Thursday, April 29 @ 2pm
Conversation will center culturally responsive capacity building practices that transformed Open Doors for Multicultural Families’ (ODMF) organizational culture to a consistent state of Equity in Action. We will share how we used an integrated vision, mission, and values-driven process to build a holistic accountability system for our equity-driven service approach and how this process and approach continues to allow our organizational members and partners to consistently rise above oppressive systems to meet various needs of culturally and linguistically diverse individuals with developmental and/or intellectual disabilities and their families. Come hear how BSK’s equity-driven funding approach contributed to ODMF’s capacity to soar when the USA was in an extreme state of unrest (Covid-19, Political Turmoil, Race and Social Injustice, etc.). Instead of laying employees off, ODMF was hiring, providing employees bonuses and self-care relief, and serving our communities and program participants and their families unique needs in record breaking numbers.
Building Bridges of Belonging to Counter Racism and Create Transformative Change - Thursday, April 29 @ 3pm
This session will offer a space for youth presenters from Communities of Opportunity & Health and Safe Environments' community partner organizations to share how their work changed in the context of COVID-19, George Floyd and the demand for racial justice. Participants comprised of community, community leaders, CBO’s, teachers and youth activists who are vested in inclusion and belonging will be able to actively engage in facilitated conversation through deeper dive breakout sessions related to systemic racism and impacts on youth and where youth leaders see systems' change happening. After breakout sessions youth and community will come back as a larger group to share, learn and create strategies to combat, dismantle and create transformative change. Session designed and facilitated by youth leaders from the Korean Community Service Center and Living Well Kent!
Rooted in Joy: FEEST Youth Organizing for Food Justice – Thursday, April 29 @ 4pm
Do you love connecting with your community through food? Are you passionate about making positive change in your school? Join FEEST Youth Leaders to learn more about how food injustice impacts our schools and communities, and how we organize for change! We will be exploring how school food is deeply connected to young people’s ability to learn and be successful in school, the school to prison pipeline, and FEEST Youth Leader’s Secret Sauce for creating sustainable, joyful campaigns for long-term systems change.
See you next week!