Article by Urban Alliance staff.

UA is equipping churches and ministry organizations to reach and serve young children and their caregivers so that they experience nurturing relationships and develop strong foundations for learning.

UA provides consulting, grants, volunteers and training to expand and enhance early childhood programs, including parenting groups, pregnancy resource centers, child and family workshops, preschools.

Through UA’s Thrive initiative, UA is helping churches and ministry organizations assess the culture of their program and support them in making improvements. UA helps match committed volunteers and donated items to create a resource-rich program environment, and grant funding to support projects that lead to program improvement. Training and printed materials provided by UA help equip early childhood programs to better connect families to available community resources. Grant support and technical assistance provided by UA helps churches and ministry organizations to identify and implement programming that is linked to improved parent-child relationships, parenting skills and child development outcomes, and an increase in knowledge about child development and parenting.

If you are interested in learning about how your church or ministry organization may participate in Thrive, consider attending the next Thrive meeting on Thursday, December 15, 2016 at 12:00 pm at Urban Alliance, 62 Village Street, East Hartford, CT. RSVP to Rosaicela Rodriguez, Urban Alliance’s Director of Implementation, Children & Youth Initiatives, at rosaicela.rodriguez@urbanalliance.com or 860.986.6052.