Ready Region Southwest

EO is proud to be selected as the lead organization for Ready Region Southwest.

As a lead organization, we are part of a statewide network bringing strategic leadership and coordination of early childhood care and education (ECCE) services and resources to prepare all children and families for success. Ready Regions focus on:

Strengthening quality: We will ensure all components are in place to coordinate quality measurement and guide improvement in publicly funded classrooms as part of VQB5.
Increasing access: We will administer Mixed Delivery programming in the region and coordinate enrollment to help parents learn about and access ECCE services that meet their needs and preferences while helping ECCE providers connect with and serve more families.
Engaging families: We will support a Family Council, made up of families from across our region who reflect the diversity of our region, to ensure the early childhood system is designed to work for families.
Building relationships: We will engage with leaders across the region to facilitate buy-in for shared accountability and benefit.

Strengthening Quality

We will ensure all components are in place to coordinate quality measurement and guide improvement in publicly funded classrooms as part of VQB5.

To prepare all children for kindergarten and in response to state law, Virginia has developed the Unified Virginia Quality Birth to Five System (VQB5) to measure and help improve the quality of all publicly-funded birth-to-five classrooms and support families to choose quality programming across program types.

All publicly-funded birth-to-five early childhood programs are required to participate in VQB5 on an annual basis. Programs that do not receive public funding have the option to participate. Details are available on the VQB5 Participation Requirements webpage.

VQB5 Quality Profiles (with information about early childhood program performance on quality measures and other topics of interest to families, policymakers, and the public) will be publicly available in Fall 2024. More information to come!

Ready Regions coordinate and support participation in VQB5 for the region's early childhood care and education (ECCE) programs. To enroll, email info.childhood@EOco.org and mention "VQB5 enrollment" in the email's subject line.

The Virginia Department of Education administers VQB5 as the Virginia Board of Education established. To learn more, visit the VDOE Quality Measurement and Improvement (VQB5) website or e-mail vqb5@doe.virginia.edu.

Increasing Access

We will administer Mixed Delivery programming in the region and coordinate enrollment to help parents learn about and access ECCE services that meet their needs and preferences while helping ECCE providers connect with and serve more families.

Ready Region Southwest identifies high-quality child care centers and family day homes to provide publicly funded services in private settings that meet the needs and preferences of families.

Quality early learning experiences are essential for preparing children to succeed in kindergarten and beyond. This impact is life-long – research has shown that children who participate in high-quality early childhood care and education (ECCE) programs are more likely to finish college, be gainfully employed, and be healthier later in life. The Mixed Delivery program provides publicly funded ECCE services in licensed (non-faith-based), private ECCE settings for eligible children. It funds full-day, year-round ECCE services for infants, toddlers, and preschoolers, meeting growing demand for publicly funded ECCE at private sites that meet the varied needs and preferences of families.

Ready Regions is working to coordinate enrollment across publicly funded ECCE programs in the region, such as childcare centers and family childcare homes (including those participating in VECF’s Mixed Delivery program) Head Start, Virginia Preschool Initiative, and others) to:

Help parents easily learn where there are available spots for their children, what they qualify for, and information such as cost, hours, and location.
Help ECCE providers keep enrollment numbers steady, communicate when they have slots available, and grow in their ability to secure the resources for the delivery of quality services.

The Birth to 5 Hub is a county-specific database of all publicly funded early childhood education programs currently participating with EO.

Engaging Families

We support a Family Council, made up of families from across our region, who reflect the diversity of our region, to ensure the early childhood system is designed to work for families.

Our Family Council provides input on early childhood design and decisions and helps our Ready Region understand and better meet families’ needs.

To get involved and learn more about the council, click here.

Building Relationships

Ready Region Southwest is committed to partnering with other organizations and stakeholders to implement this work. We collaborate and engage with regional leaders to facilitate shared accountability and benefit.