ECFC May 2nd Site Visits

On Tuesday afternoon of our meeting, we’ll visit three sites where Detroit funders, organizations and partners are building trust, and fostering belonging with kids and families, in neighborhoods and communities: Brilliant Detroit; Starfish Family Services/Marygrove Early Education Center; and the Brightmoor Neighborhood.

SiteBD

Brilliant Detroit was created in 2015 to provide a radically new approach to kindergarten readiness in neighborhoods. The idea was to create a unique delivery model in our approach to early childhood development by using underutilized housing stock to create early child and family centers in neighborhoods. Input was gathered and a model that is designed with, for, and by neighbors was built.

Brilliant Detroit was born to create kid success neighborhoods. Brilliant Detroit homes are located in 12 neighborhoods, with 6 more on the way. Each home provides holistic services for kids 0-8 predicated on evidence-based programs around health, family support, and education. Brilliant Detroit was born to create kid success neighborhoods. The neighborhoods choose Brilliant Detroit based on enough density of kids, a community organization to partner with to set up shop, and resources to get started.

What to expect on this site visit:

During your ride to our first stop, Veejah Purnell, Brilliant Detroit Community Engagement Coordinator - Central, and Eileen Storer Smith, Program Officer at W. K. Kellogg Foundation will join us to share context about our visit with Brilliant Detroit. This site visit will include stops at Brilliant Detroit homes in two neighborhoods.

Fitzgerald neighborhood: With tree-lined streets and community gardens, Fitzgerald lies within the Livernois and McNichols “Live6” corridor, giving community members access to Detroit’s Avenue of Fashion and various shops, art galleries, salons, and restaurants. The Fitzgerald Neighborhood was selected by the City of Detroit for a quarter square mile revitalization project, removing blighted structures, beautifying vacant lots, and creating homes for new residents. Residents of Fitzgerald know each other and form community by sitting on their porches, interacting with one another at the newly constructed Ella Fitzgerald Park, and participating in one of the three block clubs in the area.  Here we’ll tour house which serves as a neighborhood hub for young children and families, talk to community engagement coordinators, learn about their “Belly” to Age 3 programming, and meet their partner, Birth Detroit.

Southwest Hub:  Southwest is one of Detroit’s most culturally rich and vibrant communities, with strong schools, strong families, and groups of supporters who cater to the needs of children and families. This neighborhood is very welcoming, and though there are some challenges, neighbors work together on solutions and improvements. This location is also the home office for the Brilliant Detroit team and serves as a hub for a host of programming and pilots to test for network-wide implementation. Here we’ll tour the facility, talk with community engagement coordinators, and learn about unique aspects of the neighborhood, including dual language learners and families.

Site-SFandMGEEC

Since 1963, Starfish Family Services has been empowering families to seek brighter futures for the children of Detroit. Annually, we serve more than 3,000 children and their families across Detroit and Wayne County through two primary areas of service: early childhood education

(ages 0-5) with an array of programming including prenatal support, early learning classrooms, and coaching for caregivers; and comprehensive, clinic and home-based, behavioral health services for infants, children, and young adults (ages 0-22).  Universally, Starfish has an integrated approach to all our programming, centered in the awareness that children thrive in the context of their families, and the powerful role that safe and loving adults play in the educational success and lasing wellness of young people.

This philosophy is on ample display at the Marygrove Early Education Center (MEEC), a state of the art, center for the children of Northwest Detroit. The innovative center is part of a unique collaboration between Starfish Family Services, the Detroit Public Schools Community District, the Marygrove Conservancy, and the University of Michigan School of Education, housed at the historic Marygrove College Campus.

The MEEC’s role in the cradle to career partnership is to establish a foundation of lifelong learning as our students (ages 0-5) grow and develop, eventually transitioning to kindergarten. The center is designed to introduce students to critical thinking and problem solving and to help students begin to understand their place in the world and their role in it. Furthermore, we recognize and elevate the transformative power of healthy relationships between and among children and adults, and endeavor to create intentional connections between the campus, its partners and the neighboring community. Thus, we know that students and families will be empowered and equipped to define and advocate for their own future and the well-being of their community.

What to expect on this site visit:

Our site visit will take us on a tour of the MEEC campus, recently awarded a National Architecture Honor Award from the American Institute of Architects.  During your ride to the MEEC campus, Jonathan Hui, Senior Program Officer at The Kresge Foundation will share context for the site visit, including how Kresge’s investment contributes to the capital stack for the MEEC facility.  Onsite, MEEC we will have a program of speakers detailing the integrated education, behavioral and physical health, and community approach of the MEEC.  Attendees will hear from Celina Byrd, the principal of the MEEC, as well as our resident nurse, a teacher, and a parent of a Marygrove student.

Following discussion, we’ll tour the building in two groups, each with a slightly different focus: one will emphasize the facility and role of physical space and design in the MEEC’s mission, while the other will concentrate on programming. We will then transition to a tour of the elementary school space on the Marygrove Campus. Our visit will end in the Learning Lab for continued networking. Light refreshments will be served.

Site-Brightmoor

Committed to Creating Access and Quality Early Care and Education Opportunities

Encompassing approximately seven square miles, Brightmoor is an innovative community where people of modest means can live, learn, commune, and work in a safe, healthy culturally diverse and sustainable environment.   Neighbors know one another and lift their community from the ground up through engagement in caring for the community’s children, homegrown art, gardening, and entrepreneurial endeavors. Brightmoor’s biggest asset is its resilient residents, who roll up their sleeves to create community gardens, participate in block clubs and other organizations, transform vacant properties, and utilize the rolling hills and parks to gather together.

Through the Skillman Foundation’s Good Neighborhood initiative, Brightmoor was the target of a ten-year effort focused on children.   (2006-2016).  It is through a relationship with the Skillman Foundation that the leadership of the Max M. & Marjorie S. Fisher Foundation was introduced to the Brightmoor community in 2008.  Shortly thereafter, the Fisher Foundation launched its early childhood work in partnership with licensed early educators in the community with a focus on expanding access to affordable, high quality early care and education opportunities for Brightmoor’s youngest residents.  More than a decade later, the Brightmoor Childcare Quality Initiative (BQI) remains strong with a multitude of organizational partners co-designing programs alongside early learning business owners.

In 2017, the Max M. & Marjorie S. Fisher Foundation launched Supporting Brightmoor Leaders, an innovative grant program for community members to invest in their own leadership development and support their work in the Brightmoor Community. In December 2021, the Foundation’s trustees approved funding that will allow for the program to continue for another 5 years and for the implementation of grassroots grantmaking where residents and longtime community-based change agents in Brightmoor will guide the decision-making process. This leadership development program has enabled BQI participants to access national leadership trainings and conferences.

What to expect on this site visit:

During this site visit, we'll learn about the context and history of the neighborhood and Fisher Foundation’s partnership with the early childhood educators, their students and families.  This site visit will include a tour of home and center based early care and education sites in the neighborhood followed by a panel discussion about the co-design grantmaking approach and the benefits of long-term place-based partnership.

Scroll to Top