Oct. 12, 2023 GRAND RAPIDS, Mich. – A Grand Rapids Community College collaboration to prepare West Michigan’s littlest learners for academic success has received a $404,170 grant from Kent County’s Ready by Five Early Childhood millage.
The First Steps Kent Commission, which administers the millage funds, awarded the grant to the GRCC Play and Learn Program. Play and Learn is an extension of GRCC’s Education program and shares strategies with parents and caregivers of children from infancy through age 5 to support them in preparing their child to be ready to succeed in school.
“We share ways the adults in a child’s life can use household materials and daily routines in activities and experiences to help the child meet developmental milestones,” said Kathleen Neumann, GRCC’s child development community liaison.
Play groups meet for 60 to 90 minutes, depending on the children’s ages, at the GRCC Early Childhood Learning Laboratory and several other Kent County sites. The children enjoy stimulating activities, while the caregivers learn about child development milestones as well as literacy and child guidance skills.
Early Learning coaches work to reach caregivers in as many ways as possible. During the pandemic, Play and Learn staff created monthly activity bags for families to work with at home. Neumann said they proved to be so popular, especially with families who can’t always attend the play groups, that they’re now a permanent part of the program.
“From June 2020 to the present, we have distributed almost 10,000 Play and Learn bags to families in Kent County,” she said.
Newer additions to the program include a monthly Saturday play group as well as late afternoon and early evening play groups for working families. More information about the program, including a link to enrollment forms, is available online.
This is the third consecutive grant that the GRCC Play and Learn program has received from the early childhood millage, which Kent County voters approved in 2018. First Steps Kent awarded $671,553 to GRCC in 2020 and $1 million in 2021 that was divided over 2022 and 2023.