Introduction
Thomas and Jane centre (J&J centre) is a non-profit childhood centre based in New York. The childhood centre was constructed in the year 2014 to try to make preschool education accessible to children from low-income families. It is because getting into preschool is quite expensive, and it requires a family to have a substation amount, which in term drains the other expenses. Many families within West Bronx in New York cannot generate revenue. The income is low, and hence it is not in their budget to pay for preschool. J&J centre consequently makes sure that children in West Bronx can get the same services of receiving education.
The centre was built to make it so that children between 4 to 6years can get the needed skills. Preschool in the USA education system is essential as it forms the early years of a child’s development (Harvey, 2020). During those years, they can develop physically and cognitively. Preschool also aids in the development of social skills and a positive sense of self-worth. Everything else will fall into place if kids feel good about themselves and know how to be proud of themselves even if they make a mistake. With this, various services and programs are used to make education available to the kids in the neighbourhood.
The organization’s name shows that it is not founded to make money; instead, it is based on a robust social reason. The institution is a legal entity to assist humanity for a good cause. It organizes its content and conducts business to earn societal advantages. The most significant distinction between a non-profit and a company is money creation. A typical corporation is set up to make money, whereas a non-profit organization is set up to safeguard humans, wildlife, and the environment (Byington et al., 2018). As a result, a non-profit corporation is subject to non-distribution limits, which indicate that the company’s earnings will be used for social goals, such as launching a new initiative to aid humanity.
Introduce the Project
Since the J&J was founded, the number of children who got there has increased. The increase in the number of children going to the centre for services has strained the available resources. It has resulted in the need to get funding to conduct a project aimed at expanding the existing programs and services place. Firstly, the company operated as a non-profit organization, but later it put up a childhood centre for children between the ages of 4-and 6 years. Being a non-profit-based company for more than ten years, it has been key to seeing the need to have programs and services to improve preschool education. During that time, I have been able to experience the impact the centre has had on the community. Children that come to the centre proceed with their education, and many of them have been able to join high school. With a figure to back this, the J&J centre feels it is time that they expand the program to benefit the community better. With the expansion, many more children will be able to access the service offered by the centre.
The proposed project is expected to have been quite feasible as the centre has already created an execution plan that will be followed until the end. Firstly, the project is expected to take 12 months from when it starts. The centre hopes to get the required funding to make the project a success. The J&J centre will be responsible for implementing the project with the help of a project management firm, Johnson’s management, and a repressive from the funding organization. The Funding organization, The International for Kids for Foundation, will be required to offer 20,000 US Dollars.
The cooperation of this project with the Kids Foundation will soar the productivity of this organization due to various factors. It will benefit the project stakeholders to establish a relationship with the Kids Foundation. It can learn a few things about working with young kids within the community. At the same time, be able to get more sponsors who participate in community empowerment by making preschool education available to kids between 4-6years and also getting to follow children’s progress as they grow. The community will be positively impacted by the project, as they will receive guidance on dealing with their preschool kids.
Rationale
The programs in place include having a working preschool curriculum. The reason behind the selection of this program is that children’s vocabulary proliferates between the ages of 4-and 6 years. Additionally, education is an essential aspect of society, and it is instrumental in instilling knowledge and other relevant skills needed in life. It is a social institution that gives the crucial ability to society’s members, such as basic facts, work skills, and cultural norms and values; it is vital to make sure it has the necessary funding. The funding creates an excellent opportunity for both the rich and poor to access education. Research shows that more than half of children from low-income homes enter kindergarten without the core abilities necessary to study and succeed in kindergarten and beyond (ESEA, 2015). As a result, developing and extending each child’s thinking, skills, interests, and capacities is a process in which staff builds experiences and activities for them.
Benefits to the Children and Adults
Financial limitations might make the organization fail to execute some planned operations. Hence, when the funding is approved, and the project starts, the community, both children and adults, will enjoy many benefits. The first benefit they will experience will be strengthening the relationship between kids and children. Whether with adults or children, these relationships can be significantly diverse and influential in their own right. Perhaps it’s a grandparent’s house that they visit a couple of times a week while a parent is at work. The second benefit is the children are taken away from the harm that exists in the community. Thirdly, the project will reduce the strain families have when paying the high cost of attaining the preschool education services.
The community will benefit from the project by learning about different policies that the J&J Center has when it gets involved in charitable preschool missions. It is because the mission and strategic plan of the centre is to make sure all kids within the society can get the necessary knowledge and skills as they grow up. A SWOT analysis was evaluated to support the project’s needs for this to be possible. The SWOT analysis showed the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats.
Strengths
Since the J&J Center was started, the West Bronx community has increased the literacy levels of young children who do not have the financial capabilities to pay for their kids’ education. The programs and services that J&J Center deliver to children between the age of 4-6years receives. It makes it so that the kids from low-income families can get the same benefits as well-off families. Additionally, J&J Center works hand in hand with the community through the parents of the kids they assist, intending to improve and better the community.
Weaknesses
The project that the centre wants to undertake may undergo different challenges. Some of the weaknesses may result from internal organizational issues, which can be controlled. Identifying our flaws allows us to become aware of current difficulties and shortcomings, which we can then address to attain our objectives. Teachers’ talents, principals’ abilities, students’ abilities, financial resources, and physical resources are all aspects that can manifest as weaknesses if they are not in excellent working order. This progress, in turn, will hurt educational quality, leading to low children attendance.
Opportunity
The project has an opportunity to grow into something big, not only functional in West Bronx but also in other parts of New York. The population base would increase more, requiring more recourses and funding. The expansion of the existing services and programs would be something that the community and the project would part off through various strategies. Another opportunity presented by this project is the surety of the stakeholders and the government based on support. Finally, the project will have access to various donors and financiers as its establishment aims to help young children.
Threats
The project may also face some threats, which might negatively impact the project’s success. It might result from preschool education having yet to find its proper place. Additionally, it must be quite concerning to us. If we do not give sufficient attention to a child’s education during his most formative years, he will suffer many challenges in his later years (Payne Simon et al., 2018). Due to a lack of money, preschool education has been in a grave crisis in recent years compared to other eras of schooling. Some have even attempted to eliminate this period of instruction.
Project Description
The proposed project will include expanding the existing programs and services that the J&J Center offers. Since it was started, the centre has had the various strategies it uses to deliver the intended purpose while interacting with children between the ages of 4-6years. Program- The Center goes into the community and conducts interviews with the different families within the community. When they get a family with a young kid, they show a discussion that uses the criteria of knowing the amount of income a family receives and the amount of money put aside to cater to the kid’s educational needs. The other program the centre has used has been training women in the community who do not have the income to be young educators for the kids within J&J Center.
The project to be successful, it will require J&J Center to contract Johnson Management which will have a team in place which will facilitate the whole project. They will work hand in hand with a representative from the funding organization for oversight. The project’s success will be measured using criteria such as the capacity the centre can hold after the expansion, the number of families using J&J Center services, and the budget distribution. The project will also use the set-out objective, such as training personnel and employees who are used to educate the kids. Here the centre will outsource the staff involved in the training program within the project. The project is supposed to be sustainable and provides the required services.
Table 1: The Project Breakdown
Budget
A project budget is essential for the overall success of the project. It is because it acts as a guideline for the project to work within and, at the same time, meet the intended goal or objective (Bushouse & Mosley, 2018). The expansion of the existing program and services in preschool education that the J&J Center gives. The starting budget for this project is stated to be 5,000 US Dollars, while the final funding for the whole project is 20,000 US Dollars. This money will be distributed throughout the entire project timeline, one year. The breakdown of the start-up budget is seen in the table below.
Table 2: Start-up Fund
By having the above budget, the centre will be able to pull the project’s first phase. The funds will be accounted for, including other expenses experienced during the implementation of the project.
Standard Procedures
Some standard procedures must be followed for the non-profit to conduct the project. The project impacts the various aspects of society, and it will require strategies to be observed from the time it starts to the time it ends. The project would first have to be approved, and this is after delivering or formulating all the requirements and facts to back them up. Notably, it deals with preschool, and various laws and regulations must be observed (Castetbon & Andreyeva, 2019). The Acts give the standard within which the project can operate. They include the Pre-K Education strategies.
Conclusion
The expansion of the existing program and service in preschool is a good project which needs to be implemented in the West Bronx neighbourhood. By wanting to expand the method in place, it shows the commitment J&J Center has when it comes to providing preschool education to the low-income families in the community. The kids between the ages of 4-6years will enjoy many benefits when the whole project is implemented. The community will also enjoy various benefits from employment to the levels of literate people going up. This program will require funding for it to be achievable and, at the same time, make more change to the community.
References
Bushouse, B. K., & Mosley, J. E. (2018). The intermediary roles of foundations in the policy process: building coalitions of interest. Interest Groups & Advocacy, 7(3), 289–311.
Byington, T. A., Kim, Y., & Bales, D. (2018). Literacy in the early childhood classroom: A SWOT analysis of a multi-state literacy train-the-trainer program. Jhseonline.Com. Web.
Castetbon, K., & Andreyeva, T. (2019). Obesity and motor skills among 4 to 6-year-old children in the United States: nationally-representative surveys. BMC Pediatrics, 12(1), 28.
Harvey, M. (2020). Preschool curriculum: What your child will learn. Parents Journal.
Payne Simon, L., Scobie, K., Backler, P., McDowell, C., Cotton, C., Cloutier, S., & Nolan, C. (2018). By us and for us: A story of early childhood development systems change and results in a rural context. The Foundation Review, 10(4).