Jumpstart for Young Children

Jumpstart for Young Children is a national non-profit based out of Boston, Massachusetts after being founded in Yale University in 1993 to help prepare preschool children to succeed in their primary education. The Jumpstart model pairs college students across the United States with preschoolers in order to increase skills in language, literacy, and social and emotional development. Serving some 13,000 children in 2007, the organization brings its method to these under-served children via 3,500 college students and older adults, referred to as Corps Members. The majority of Corps Members work through AmeriCorps as part of a service commitment that lasts the whole year.

The Model

Jumpstart's early childhood educational goal is to enhance the literacy, language, social, and initiative skills of young children by capitalizing on positive Corps member-child and Corps member-family interactions. Jumpstart Corps members are trained to facilitate children's development following four key principles: utilizing developmentally appropriate practices, engaging children in active learning, striking a balance of adult-intiated and child-initiated learning, and supporting children's early or emergent reading and writing.

Jumpstart classroom sessions operate under two interrelated systems: a pull-out and integrated model (IMOD). The pull-out model functions on a pairing basis, where each college student works individually with a student on reading, activities, and dramatic play. Although following the same goals, IMOD incorporates the college students into the classroom itself to engage all the children with songs, literacy, and activities with the hope of developing the young children's minds in preparation for school. Corps members work one-to-one with their partner children twice a week, working primarily on language, literacy, social, and intiative skills. In addition to the work they put in with their partner children, Corps members also spend two to five hours a week in the child's classroom, observing the child and providing assistance to the classroom teacher and other students.

Major Campaigns

Last August 24 marked a national campaign, called Read for the Record, to raise awareness of early literacy and the importance of reading to children of all ages. The children's book, "The Little Engine that Could" attributed to Watty Piper was re-released with an addendum for information about how best to read with children. Across the nation over 150,000 children read the story, earning a spot in "The Guinness Book of World Records". This year on September 20, the campaign will be repeated, once again seeking to generate support and visibility for early literacy with spokespeople including Matt Lauer and William Shatner. The re-edited book for this year is "The Story of Ferdinand" by Munro Leaf.

University Sites

Jumpstart operates out of the Universities who provide support and college students to fulfill its mission of engaging young children in developmentally appropriate activities through work in under-served communities in the area. This is a complete list as divided into the 5 regions: Mid-Atlantic, Central, Northeast, Southern, Western.

Mid-Atlantic
• Baltimore at Morgan State University
• Bronx at Manhattan College
• Brooklyn at Long Island University
• Charlottesville at University of Virginia
• Hobart & William Smith Colleges
• Borough of Manhattan Community College & City University of New York
• Columbia University
• Temple University
• University of Pittsburgh
• St. John's University
• University of Rochester
• Syracuse at Le Moyne College
• Georgetown University
• The George Washington University
• Howard University

Central
• University of Akron
• DePaul University
• Roosevelt University
• University of Missouri - Columbia
• University of Michigan - Dearborn with Henry Ford Community College
• University of Wisconsin - Eau Claire
• University of Missouri - Kansas City
• University of Wisconsin - Madison
• Minnesota State University
• Illinois State University
• St. Louis University
• Eastern Michigan University
• Ohio University

Northeast
• Emerson College
• Northeastern University
• Simmons College with Colleges of the Fenway
• Suffolk University • Tufts University
• University of Massachusetts Boston
• Wheelock College
• Bridgewater State College
• University of Rhode Island

Southern
• Georgia Institute of Technology
• Georgia State University
• Morehouse College with Spelman College
• Baton Rouge at Southern University
• Kentucky State University
• Southeastern Louisiana University
• Houston Community College
• University of Kentucky, Lexington
• Texas Tech University, Lubbock
• University of New Orleans
• Florida State University, Tallahassee

Western
• Claremont at Pitzer College
• California State University, Fresno
• Fresno City College
• California State University, Fullerton
• University of California, Irvine
• California State University, Northridge
• St. Mary's College of California
• City College of San Francisco
• San Francisco State University
• Pepperdine University
• University of Washington, Seattle
• University of California, Berkeley
• Stanford University

Links

http://www.jstart.org