Bright Start Northeast Tennessee
A new birth-through-third grade early care and education endeavor
Bright starts finish strong. That’s why STRONG Accountable Care Community is proud to be a part of the Bright Start Tennessee Network (Bright Start TN) – an initiative of Tennesseans for Quality Early Education (TQEE) that brings together a statewide network of community partnerships dedicated to accelerating early learning outcomes and closing achievement and opportunity gaps for Tennessee children birth through third grade.
What we’ll do
We will work toward the goal of increasing the percentage of third grade children who are proficient in reading and in math. To accomplish this, we will:
- Use data to better understand barriers to early learning
- Identify and leverage existing local and state assets and resources
- Establish and scale evidence-based and promising strategies
- Track outcomes and use data for continuous improvement
- Share learnings among peer communities and with local and state policymakers
- Inform TQEE’s state policy agenda and expand our advocacy network
Where we are
Bright Start NETN has made a significant investment of time and energy in engaging with stakeholders throughout the 10-county region. This summation report below shares information in four major categories: Target Population, Home Environment, Learning Environments Outside the Home, and Community Supports.
View the Community and Stakeholder Engagement Summary.
Using the data above, we will create a plan for Northeast Tennessee by the summer of 2022, with implementation expected to be complete by 2025. Our plan will incorporate goals and strategies in three major areas:
- High-quality birth-through-age-eight learning environments
- Health and development beginning at birth
- Supportive and supported families and communities
Why it’s important
Research has repeatedly shown that the first eight years of a child’s life are a critical development period, and third grade is widely acknowledged as a benchmark year that determines future academic success. Yet more than two-thirds of Tennessee’s third graders are not proficient in reading or in math. Our state is facing a crisis that the Bright Start TN Network will help fix.