As the population of Baton Rouge, La., swelled with displaced New Orleanians after Hurricane Katrina, Tulane University child psychiatrist and public health researcher Neil Boris and his colleagues realized the evacuees would need high-quality early childhood programming as they moved from shelters and hotels into mobile home settlements.
The coalition formed from that realization has now developed a plan to provide needed early childhood programming and received a commitment of $2 million from Rosie's For All Kids Foundation, started by comedienne Rosie O'Donnell. The money will be administered through the YWCA of Greater Baton Rouge.
"We knew the community would need more family services modeled on Head Start and Early Head Start," Boris says. "A coalition of community agencies came together days after the hurricane and began to develop a long-term, sustainable approach to providing those services. We're expanding existing services in Baton Rouge and developing new programs for the families that are not close to downtown."
Early Head Start programs provide services before birth through age 3. Head Start programs serve children ages 3 to 5.
Boris and his colleagues plan to provide services based on the Head Start model in two mobile home settlements: one in Baker, La., with 570 homes, and one just outside of East Baton Rouge, with 130 homes. In addition to early childhood programming, the trailer parks will have after-school programs and supervised playgrounds for adolescents. Boris says that within a year they anticipate serving 1,000 families.
"These programs make it possible for parents to work, for children to have high-quality activities and for us to hire talented people from the very communities that are housing displaced residents," Boris says. "To be able to throw ourselves into work that helps the community was healing for us, too."
A 3-year-old funded research partnership with the YWCA of Greater Baton Rouge to provide high-quality early childhood interventions put Boris in an ideal position to help with the planning. Charlotte Provenza, director of the YWCA of Greater Baton Rouge and a long-time collaborator, acted as point person for the groups involved.
In addition to the funding from Rosie's For All Kids Foundation, they received funding from the Greater Baton Rouge Area Foundation. The federal Administration for Children and Families has agreed to provide support and training staff, and FEMA has agreed to provide supplies for the modular buildings.
Boris is a child psychiatrist and associate professor of community health sciences at the Tulane University School of Public Health and Tropical Medicine. Tulane psychologists Sherry Heller and Angela Keyes are assisting.
