Program Profile: Sheltering Arms Early Education and Family Center−International Village in Atlanta, Georgia

Sheltering Arms Early Education and Family Center–International Village is committed to strengthening families and building their resilience in an ever-changing community.

Program Overview
Sheltering Arms was founded in 1888 to serve mothers working in Georgia cotton mills and has grown to include 16 early childhood education programs. Today, the Sheltering Arms Early Education and Family Center–International Village serves a rapidly diversifying community in metropolitan Atlanta.

The community highly values children and their families, as evidenced by the program’s presence there. Diane Bellem, vice president of the Georgia Training Institute, which is part of Sheltering Arms, says, “Mothers and fathers, regardless of race, income, cultural identity, or religion, enroll their children in the center, confident that their children will be safe and learning and their whole family will be accepted and valued. We are mindful that each family is unique, and while they may have similarities within their cultural groups, all people in a cultural group are not the same. Bringing people together from diverse backgrounds is a challenge we embrace.”

Family support is a core service and an intentional part of the program’s mission. While the management team includes two family support coordinators, the program embeds family support in a holistic, day-to-day, whole-program approach. Family engagement is key to the program’s success with children, and staff strive to inform, involve, and inspire parents.

Sheltering Arms–International Village has several goals for family support, including

• promoting growth and development in families as they seek to fulfill their hopes and dreams,
• assisting parents in coping with the routine conflicts of everyday life,
• helping parents develop positive life skills and overcome self-defeating life patterns, and
• providing a social network that offers encouragement in the face of disappointment and loss.

Sheltering Arms draws heavily from the Center for the Study of Social Policy’s Strengthening Families approach for building a strong foundation with five protective factors.

Family Engagement Program Practices

Two-Way Communication
Sheltering Arms–International Village staff immediately establish a working partnership with each parent , when he or she first calls to inquire about services. They build trusting relationships during the enrollment interview and then through regular personal or home visits. The program creates an atmosphere of support and concern so parents feel comfortable and confident in expressing their feelings, thoughts, and needs. Bellem says, “Our family support system offers parents daily encouragement, a listening ear, a bit of humor, a shoulder to cry on, and a place of respite in the day-to-day struggle of raising a family. Parents soon learn they can depend on our staff for help, whatever the need, because we will be there for them in the best of times and the worst of times.”

Learning Activities at Home and in the Community
Staff at Sheltering Arms–International Village place a heavy emphasis on literacy and maximize opportunities to promote children’s learning outside of the program. For example,

• The program has various lending libraries stocked with materials families can borrow. There is a lending library in each classroom and one in the Family Place, a space set aside for families’ use.
• The program encourages families to access the public library by holding a library card drive in the fall.
• The Early Reading First program sends home monthly literacy packs with activities that families can do with their child.
• The program encourages families to build their own home library, and children receive books through programs like Books & Bears and Operation Storybook. In 2009, Home Depot donated bookshelves to all the children for their growing home libraries!

A Comprehensive Program-Level System
Professional development is important at Sheltering Arms. In fact, building the professional capacity of the staff is so important that the organization created the Georgia Training Institute (GTI) to provide early care and education and family development professionals with research-based training. GTI training includes the Child Development Associate Credential, the Family Development Credential, implementation training for Strengthening Families, the national Parent Services Project Stronger Together curriculum, and many other professional development resources. All GTI professional development is aligned with NAEYC standards, Head Start Performance Standards, Georgia Professional Development competencies, and Strengthening Families. Staff members are prepared to work with children with challenging behaviors using training from the Center on the Social and Emotional Foundations for Early Learning. Teachers promote children’s healthy social and emotional development by implementing the Second Step and I Can Problem Solve social-emotional curricula. Regular staff meetings support teachers in their work.

Elaine Draeger, Sheltering Arms’ executive director, explains, “We want our staff prepared to increase their intentionality in the work they already do with families. We also want them to play a greater role in an ‘early warning system’ to prevent child abuse and neglect. We offer staff a menu of courses to enhance skills and competence in building the protective factors so they can fully implement the Strengthening Families strategies.”

Developed for NAEYC's Engaging Diverse Families Project through a generous grant from the Picower Foundation.
© National Association for the Education of Young Children.