Early last month, early educators attended the conference “Creando Raíces Fuertes en la Educación Temprana” (Creating Strong Roots in Early Childhood Education), which was hosted by ECCHO-Latino and Neighborhood Villages and sponsored by The Irene E. & George A. Davis Foundation.
The conference was conducted in Spanish, with English translation, to serve Spanish-speaking early educators.
Several weeks later, the conference organizers joined The 9:30 Call to provide an update on the event.
The conference’s session topics were:
- The Power of Everyday Moments
- Enchanting: The Art of Reconnecting with Yourself (Educator Well-Being & Self-Care)
- The Child Care Business: Structure, Success, and Sustainability, and
What was the “why” behind the conference?
“We did it because Spanish-speaking educators deserve to be seen, heard and valued,” Harold Blanco, the co-founder of ECCHO-Latino, explained on The 9:30 call, adding that language shouldn’t be a barrier to early educators’ dreams. “For far too long our community navigated spaces not built for them. So we built our own.”
Blanco is also a co-owner of Paula’s Barn, Inc., a family child care program in Springfield, Mass., and he is an alumni of Strategies for Children’s Advocacy Network for Early Childhood.
Lisa Garcia, the Director of Early Relational Health at Neighborhood Villages, added:
“We said that the conference was tackling two parts… the bones and the heart of the work we do.” The bones, Garcia explained, meant a focus on the business of running a program since most of the participants were family child care providers. And the heart is the relationships that early educators form with families and children.
And on The 9:30 Call, Waleska Lugo-DeJesús, the Chief Equity Officer (CEO) of Inclusive Strategies, and one of the conference’s keynote speakers, praised the conference for being well-organized, fun, and musical, thanks to the performance of a violin player.
“My heart is still very warm,” she said, “because I did have attendees come to me after the keynote and reflect back what part of the keynote was still sitting with them.”
Co-organizer Paula Echeverri Durango shared, “We are still riding the high from the conference—it truly meant the world to see everything come together and to feel the energy of our community.”
To learn more, check out the video and the slides above, or contact Paula Echeverri Durango, co-Founder and president of the Board at ECCHO-Latino. Her email is paula@eccho-latino.org.