Welcome to
Miami Valley
Child Development Centers
Miami Valley Child Development Centers, Inc. (MVCDC) is a private non-profit
corporation established in 1964. MVCDC is the Head Start grantee for Clark,
Madison and Montgomery Counties, Ohio. Through our federally funded Early
Head Start and Head Start programs we are funded to provide comprehensive
services to 2,763 children ages 3-5 years, and 110 children ages 0-3 years.
What is Head Start?
In 1965, the Office of Economic Opportunity launched Project Head Start
as an eight-week summer program. Head Start was part of the War on Poverty,
which embodied a basic belief in education as the solution to poverty.
Head Start was designed to help break the "cycle of poverty" by providing
preschool children of low income families with a comprehensive program
to meet their emotional, social, health, nutritional, and psychological
needs. At that time, part of the new government thinking on the nature
of poverty and the uses of education, and born of the civil-rights movement,
was that the government was obligated to help disadvantaged groups in
order to compensate for inequality in social or economic conditions. The
concept of "maximum feasible participation" represented a new philosophy
in federal government that low income people should help plan and run
their own programs.
Head Start has grown from the eight-week demonstration project to include
full day/year services and many program options. Families with children
birth to age 3 have been served in Head Start since at least 1967 by Migrant/Seasonal
Head Start and Parent Child Centers, however in the mid-1990’s, birth
to age 3 services were formalized and expanded with the inception of Early
Head Start.
Program Options
- Full-day Head Start services are available to eligible children. Services are provided five days per week in centers operated by MVCDC. A limited number of centers provide year round services.
- Full-Day Head Start/Child Care partnership services are available to eligible children. Services are provided five days per week in privately owned child care centers that partner with MVCDC to provide Head Start services to eligible children. These centers are open year round
- Part-Day Head Start services for 3 1/2 hours in the morning or afternoon are provided to eligible children. Part-day services are provided Monday through Thursday from September to May.
- Home Base Head Start is a home visiting program where a qualified MVDCDC employee goes to the falmily's home one day per week and works directly with the enrolled child and parent(s). The Home Base program operates from September to May.
- Full-Day Early Head Start services are available to eligible children ages 0 to 3 years. Services are provided five days per week in the centers operated by MVCDC and private child care centers that partner with MVCDC. Services are provided year round.
Donations
Mvcdc's primary goal is to provide high quality services to the children
and families we serve. Although funded by the federal and state
governments, MVCDC is not funded at a level sufficient to meet the needs
of the children we serve. Monetary contributions can be made to
MVCDC, a 501(c)(3) tax exempt organization, and donors may be entitled
to a tax deduction of an itemized return is filed. Examples of how
donated funds and supplies are used to support the children are supplying
extra books, field trips, additional staff training, and improvements
to the classrooms.
Volunteers
MVCDC encourages individuals to volunteer in the Head Start classrooms.
Many volunteers come to the classrooms on a regular basis to read books
to children as part of our literacy program. Other people volunteer
their time to assist the teachers as they implement the daily lesson plan.