Recruit & Retain Staff in Your Recompetition Grant
Having qualified, engaged staff is a key driver of every Head Start and Early Head Start program’s success. With them, it’s easier to stay focused on program quality while building relationships with parents and community members. Without them, it’s a never-ending cycle of recruiting, training, and turnover.
Losing staff, for whatever reason, places a burden on the program, parents, and students. As such, the OHS has developed evaluation criteria to ascertain how effective recompetition applicants are in their plans to recruit and retain staff.
Tips for Describing Plans to Recruit Staff
- When describing your recruitment process, be specific on the strategies you use to find staff
For example, do you partner with your local employment agency? Advertise at local colleges or universities? Do you use your website, word-of-mouth, or a staff referral program?
- How are you certain that the staff you hire are going to be a good fit? How do you know that they are able to implement your research-based curriculum? Put the Reviewer’s mind at ease by explaining “how you know” they’re a good match
For example, do you use any processes to assess their abilities and knowledge before they are hired (e.g. behavior-based interviews, observation, requesting portfolio work samples, etc.)? Does your interview process incorporate questions about the Head Start Child Development and Early Learning Framework or the State Early Learning Standards?
Retention Tips
- Some applicants get so preoccupied with their recruitment strategies that they fail to give adequate attention to their retention practices in their grant. You need to explain both:
For example, do you have a competitive benefit and salary package? If so, how do you use it to keep staff? Do you regularly incorporate their feedback about what they need to be more successful in their work? Do you assure a good “fit” in the first place, making it less likely they will leave later?
- Another idea might be to explain your career ladder and how staff gain additional training and experience in order to be promoted (either laterally or vertically).
When staff know the expectations, they can make informed decisions about career choices, education, and getting involved in extra activities that might help others see their potential.
- Finally, be specific in how you use internal systems (e.g. communication and professional development, record keeping, monitoring, etc.) to retain staff.
For example, how does helping them set and meet their professional development goals lead to higher quality staff, those who are more confident in their skills and enjoy their work more?
These examples are meant only to help you start thinking about providing a very explanatory description—one that is easy to follow and meets all the required Performance Standards and regulations. Each program must assess the best way to respond to the Office of Head Start evaluation criteria.
Need Help? Gain an Advantage Over Your Competitors!
As an OHS vetted, trained, and experienced recompetition reviewer, I can help you assess your response to the evaluation criteria before you submit it to OHS.
I will evaluate your responses line-by-line against the evaluation criteria so that you can strengthen your grant before you submit it.
I can assess whether you’ve answered the questions thoroughly, as well as answer questions you may have about the process. Please don’t hesitate to contact me.
To your success,
Kimberley
About the Author
Kimberley Seitz, Ph.D, is an experienced, OHS vetted, recompetition grant reviewer with a 12-year history of supporting Head Start and Early Head Start programs. Whether it was working as a Deputy Director in an Early Head Start program, providing Program Design and Management Training & Technical Assistance, or consulting, coaching, and training staff, Kimberley is committed to quality improvement and program success!
Address MH, Violence, Homelessness, & Substance Abuse in DRS
One of the challenges that Head Start and/or Early Head Start applicants involved in the Office of Head Start’s Designation Renewal System (DRS) face, is the ability to fully answer each evaluation criteria, including the sub criteria.
It’s easy to think you’re answering it only to later realize that somehow you got off tangent or didn’t provide a complete answer. It’s also possible to skip it by accident.
Missed Evaluation Criteria
One particular section that seems to be forgotten by DRS applicants in the Achieving Early Learning and Development Outcomes section is how they plan to offer (either directly or through referrals) support for families struggling with mental health challenges, domestic violence, homelessness, or substance abuse.
Even when applicants don’t miss it, sometimes they fail to provide enough information about how they provide services, or more typically, they state that they refer to another community agency but don’t describe that process or how those services are provided.
For example, you might want to address:
Specific actions you or your community partner will take to support mental health challenges for children and families.
• Will counseling be provided? Support groups?
• How will services be individualized to meet the needs and developmental level of the person seeking services?
• Is the person a certified mental health provider with experience working with the age group or population being referred?
• Will you provide any additional supports within the program, such as educational workshops, additional home visits or Family Advocacy services?
How you provide additional supports for individuals who are struggling with domestic violence, homelessness, and substance abuse.
• Do you offer programs for them or provide special workshops or other types of information?
• Do you collaborate with community agencies to ensure they are prioritized for enrollment in that agency as well, thereby offering dual support but avoiding duplication of services?
• Do you provide free resources (e.g. food, diapers, wipes, etc.)?
• Do you help with their transportation needs, so they can access needed services?
• Do you address recovery in the family goal setting process, if applicable?
• Do you have formal partnerships with agencies that must also comply with the McKinney Vento Act?
What supports are in place for children who have been exposed to drugs?
• Do you work with recovery programs to train your staff?
• Do you provide more assistance in the classrooms when needed?
• Do you customize classroom lessons to address the different needs and ability levels?
As you can see, there’s a lot to consider in this particular evaluation criteria. My advice is to think both globally and tactically. Explain your system and provide the supporting details necessary to help the Reviewers award you points and cite your response as a strength.
These examples are meant only to help you start thinking about providing a very explanatory description—one that is easy to follow and meets all the required Performance Standards and regulations. Each program must assess the best way to respond to the Office of Head Start evaluation criteria.
Need Help? Gain an Advantage Over Your Competitors!
As an OHS vetted, trained, and experienced recompetition reviewer, I can help you assess your response to the evaluation criteria before you submit it to OHS.
I will evaluate your responses line-by-line against the evaluation criteria so that you can strengthen your grant before you submit it.
I can assess whether you’ve answered the questions thoroughly, as well as answer questions you may have about the process. Please don’t hesitate to contact me.
To your success,
Kimberley
Kimberley@kcoachconsult.com
About the Author
Kimberley Seitz, Ph.D, is an experienced, OHS vetted, recompetition grant reviewer with a 12-year history of supporting Head Start and Early Head Start programs. Whether it was working as a Deputy Director in an Early Head Start program, providing Program Design and Management Training & Technical Assistance, or consulting, coaching, and training staff, Kimberley is committed to quality improvement and program success!
Substantiate Claims in Your Head Start/Early Head Start DRS Grant
Substantiate Claims
One of the easiest ways to improve the quality of your Head Start and/or Early Head Start recompetition grant is to focus on substantiating your claims.
Every recompetition grant I’ve ever read has unsubstantiated claims to some degree.
If you are part of the Designation Renewal System (DRS), and you want to strengthen your grant, here are three methods to substantiate your writing and help you get started.
Three Methods to Substantiate Claims
1. You can state your claim and then provide an example to illustrate
For example you might say something like: “We have an effective recruitment system to ensure that we remain fully enrolled and have an eligibility list that helps us fill vacancies within the 30 day requirement. For example, we….”
2. You can provide more information about your claim to give context. For example, you can clearly describe how something is done, who is involved, whether there are written documents supporting the process, when it occurs, the outcomes of it, etc. The idea is to give lots of detail!
To illustrate, you could substantiate your disability services by saying something like: “we meet the unique needs of children with disabilities by first ensuring that parents understand their child’s rights under the IDEA and develop advocacy skills that can support their child’s needs in school. To do that we…. Second, we understand that children with disabilities might need special accommodations, such as a feeding tube or mobility assistance, so we …. Third, we train our staff to identify suspected disabilities and follow our referral procedure to ensure that children with suspected disabilities receive further screening, evaluation, and treatment (as needed). We do this through… The idea is that you provide enough detail that it’s clear that you are providing this service and have fully answered the evaluation criteria
3. You can use data or another source to substantiate your claim. This can come from a journal, book, research study, publication, statistic, another agency’s information, etc.
This is one of the easiest ones to do. For example, you might say something like “according to the ABC Chamber of Commerce’s 2015 community survey, there has been a 12% increase in immigrant families into our service area over the past three years due to the availability of language services and employment. As a result, we have…(show outcomes and service responses)
I hope these tips are helpful in showing you how to strengthen your DRS grant.
These examples are meant only to help you start thinking about providing a very explanatory description—one that is easy to follow and meets all the required Performance Standards and regulations. Each program must assess the best way to respond to the Office of Head Start evaluation criteria.
Need Help? Gain an Advantage Over Your Competitors!
As an OHS vetted, trained, and experienced recompetition reviewer, I can help you assess your response to the evaluation criteria before you submit it to OHS.
I will evaluate your responses line-by-line against the evaluation criteria so that you can strengthen your grant before you submit it.
I can assess whether you’ve answered the questions thoroughly, as well as answer questions you may have about the process. Please don’t hesitate to contact me.
To your success,
Kimberley
Kimberley@kcoachconsult.com
About the Author
Kimberley Seitz, Ph.D, is an experienced, OHS vetted, recompetition grant reviewer with a 12-year history of supporting Head Start and Early Head Start programs. Whether it was working as a Deputy Director in an Early Head Start program, providing Program Design and Management Training & Technical Assistance, or consulting, coaching, and training staff, Kimberley is committed to quality improvement and program success!
Identify the PFCE Framework Plan in Your DRS Grant
If you’re an existing grantee, or if you’re applying for one of the Head Start and/or Early Head Start grants available through the Designation Renewal system (DRS), OHS requires you to explain your plan to implement the PFCE Framework aka the Head Start Parent Family and Community Engagement Framework—as well as offer family literacy and parenting-skills training using evidence-based curricula and approaches.
To make this discussion easier, I’m going to break this up into 2 blogs. This first one will focus on the PFCE evaluation criteria and the second will focus on the remaining sub criteria (e.g. support for mental health challenges, domestic violence, homelessness, and substance abuse).
Elements You May Want to Consider:
As you develop your response to the evaluation criteria, you may want to include information that shows that you are working toward family and parent engagement as a system rather than an isolated approach.
Think beyond the individual activities that you’re doing and explain your overall process. Show the interconnectedness of each piece of the process.
For example, who is responsible for implementing the PFCE? How do you know it’s being implemented as OHS envisioned? What impact is it having on families, parents, and your communities? How do you know that your efforts are making a difference (i.e. record keeping and monitoring systems)? Etc. If you are new to EHS or HS, you might want to check out the PFCE framework at: http://eclkc.ohs.acf.hhs.gov/hslc/tta-system/family/docs/pfce-framework.pdf
Is your plan based on proven, research-based curricula and approaches?
- Don’t just say that it is, provide the details and supporting evidence. For example, what’s the name of the curricula you’re using? Where is it published? What has the research found? Etc.
What specifically do you do to improve literacy and parenting skills? For example, do you offer classes? If so, how many and what are the outcomes you’ve experienced?
- OHS has a research to practice series available on various research interventions, promising practices, and program strategies that can help guide you in strengthening your response and in developing a research-based practice. Check out: http://eclkc.ohs.acf.hhs.gov/hslc/tta-system/family/rtp-series.html
Does your plan support families as learners? How about family well-being? What specifically do you do to help families set and reach their professional goals or improve their connections to community services that can support their families?
Remember, that you don’t have to provide the services directly. You can partner with local agencies (e.g. schools, libraries, other non-profit programs, etc.).
If you need more information, check out the interactive guides, webisodes, and other resources on the Early Childhood Learning and Knowledge Center’s website at: http://eclkc.ohs.acf.hhs.gov/hslc/tta-system/family/resources.html
These examples are meant only to help you start thinking about providing a very explanatory description—one that is easy to follow and meets all the required Performance Standards and regulations. Each program must assess the best way to respond to the Office of Head Start evaluation criteria.
Need Help? Gain an Advantage Over Your Competitors!
As an OHS vetted, trained, and experienced recompetition reviewer, I can help you assess your response to the evaluation criteria before you submit it to OHS.
I will evaluate your responses line-by-line against the evaluation criteria so that you can strengthen your grant before you submit it.
I can assess whether you’ve answered the questions thoroughly, as well as answer questions you may have about the process.
Please don’t hesitate to contact me.
To your success,
Kimberley
About the Author
Kimberley Seitz, Ph.D, is an experienced, OHS vetted, recompetition grant reviewer with a 12-year history of supporting Head Start and Early Head Start programs. Whether it was working as a Deputy Director in an Early Head Start program, providing Program Design and Management Training & Technical Assistance, or consulting, coaching, and training staff, Kimberley is committed to quality improvement and program success!
Avoid Staff Qualification Mistakes in DRS Grant
Sometimes, applicants competing in the Office of Head Start’s Designation Renewal System (DRS) make easily correctable mistakes when it comes to documenting their key staff’s qualifications in their Head Start and/or Early Head Start recompetition grant.
I want to help you avoid making those same mistakes, so I’m going to highlight three common mistakes applicants make and provide some alternatives for you to consider as you decide how to respond to the evaluation criteria around staff qualifications.
Documenting Staff Qualifications
Mistake #1 Relying on staff resumes to highlight their qualifications
Alternative: Use the resume as a supplemental document, but take the time to highlight their qualifications, experiences, awards, and any other features you feel will help demonstrate how they are positioned to help your organization succeed.
For example, if your Disability Manager used to work for the Part B agency, explain how that experience helps him/her understand how to work collaboratively with a multi-disciplinary team, or how their knowledge of disability regulations will help parents become better advocates for their child’s education
Mistake #2 Describing key staff’s qualifications in terms of their degrees and number of years of service in your program but not clearly describing their major functions and responsibilities in the narrative
Alternative: The evaluation criteria asks that you describe both function and responsibilities, so don’t forget to do both. As you write, help the Reviewer understand what their jobs are. For example, does your Health Manager have bilingual skills that will help him/her communicate with pregnant women, children, and families? Are you contracting with a registered dietician? If so, how do they work with your management team? Who oversees nutrition to ensure that the regulations are met?
Take the time after you finish writing to critically review your response to see if it makes sense to someone not familiar with your program. Do you need to explain jargon? Maybe articulate something more clearly? If you’re unsure about the clarity, ask someone in a different position to read what you wrote and see if they understand what you’re trying to say. Board and Policy Council members might be a good sounding board for you to consider.
Mistake # 3 Documenting experience serving infants and toddlers but failing to describe the experience, knowledge, and credentials of key staff in relationship to pregnant women (EHS only)
Alternative: If you are planning to provide EHS services, it will be important for you to demonstrate knowledge and experience relate to the needs of pregnant women. For example, are you going to have someone employed onsite or use a contracted nurse to do home visits? Do you provide training to staff on fetal development, postnatal or postpartum needs, birthing information, etc. If any of your staff hold specific credentials for working with pregnant women, you can identify those as well.
It’s important to show your staff’s qualifications across your populations, so be inclusive of your different populations in your responses to the DRS evaluation criteria.
These are just a few of the common mistakes I’ve seen grant applicants make. These examples are meant only to help you start thinking about providing a very explanatory description—one that is easy to follow and meets all the required Performance Standards and regulations. Each program must assess the best way to respond to the Office of Head Start evaluation criteria.
Need Help? Gain an Advantage Over Your Competitors!
As an OHS vetted, trained, and experienced recompetition reviewer, I can help you assess your response to the evaluation criteria before you submit it to OHS.
I will evaluate your responses line-by-line against the evaluation criteria so that you can strengthen your grant before you submit it.
I can assess whether you’ve answered the questions thoroughly, as well as answer questions you may have about the process. Please don’t hesitate to contact me.
To your success,
Kimberley
About the Author
Kimberley Seitz, Ph.D, is an experienced, OHS vetted, recompetition grant reviewer with a 12-year history of supporting Head Start and Early Head Start programs. Whether it was working as a Deputy Director in an Early Head Start program, providing Program Design and Management Training & Technical Assistance, or consulting, coaching, and training staff, Kimberley is committed to quality improvement and program success!
