Highlighting how early learning helps entire communities thrive

And when kids attend high-quality early learning programs, they are more likely to start kindergarten on track – setting them up for all of these benefits and life-long success. 

Yet too many children miss out on these important learning opportunities because there aren’t enough affordable early childhood programs.

That’s one of the many reasons The Innovation Project (TIP) partnered with Edgecombe County Public Schools (ECPS) to create new early childhood education programs to serve the Edgecombe County community. 

As part of this work, ECPS is offering early learning academies through which parents can take their 3 and 4 year olds to free early learning sessions, parent academies to help caregivers support their children, expanded preK enrollment and an early learning collaborative to help early learning leaders work together.

As ECPS launched these new programs, TIP and the district had an important goal: help other district leaders and the community learn about this work, and show funders why it’s so critical, too. The team needed help spreading the word – and Forthright was happy to jump right in. 

Our team partnered with TIP and ECPS to create a campaign that would reach both district leaders and funders through a variety of channels. Our team: 

• Created a video to help tell ECPS’s story. One Business Insider study shows that there are more than 244.4 million digital video viewers in the US alone – demonstrating the power of video. We partnered with the ECPS team to create a video that would help our audiences imagine early learning work, from what the activities look like to how the kids learn (and have fun!). Through this video, audiences also get to “meet” a parent, a leader in the program and the superintendent spearheading this work. We managed the full video process, from creating a storyboard and script to filming and editing the video with one of our trusted videographer partners. 

• Delivered three beautifully designed print and web ready one pagers. We knew that the teams’ target audiences of superintendents, leaders and funders are busy – and we only had moments to grab their attention! Since people are more likely to notice and understand information when it's paired with compelling graphics, we wrote and designed three one pagers. The ECPS and TIP teams can now easily share them with district leaders and funders to show them what this work is all about!

• Managed photography to put a face to the topic. We know that by making a topic personal for our audiences, we can build strong connections. Our team worked with a professional photographer who specializes in snapping portraits of children to take pictures of the early learning program in action. As a result, ECPS and TIP now have more than 50 authentic pictures they can use throughout their communications, from using them in their collateral to featuring them on their websites. 

• Wrote and designed an amplification toolkit to make sharing easy. From social media messaging to putting content online, there are many great ways to share information. We created an easy-to-use toolkit with everything from sample social media messages to newsletter text personalized for each audience.

Most importantly, the county’s youngest learners are getting ready to start kindergarten on track, thanks to these critical programs.