Charlotte forum shows love for early childhood educators

MONICA SPEDRA | UNSPLASH

Family Child Care & Center Enrichment Foundation will focus on self-care and advocacy at its annual conference for early childcare educators April 30-May 2 in Charlotte.

Early childhood educators and the families they serve will find support and encouragement for well-being in Charlotte. 

The Charlotte-based Family Child Care & Center Enrichment Foundation will host its annual conference April 30-May 2 at Embassy Suites by Hilton Charlotte, 4800 S Tryon St. The meeting centers on supporting early childhood educators mentally, physically and spiritually. Organizers expect childcare professionals from 10 states to attend the retreat-style gathering.

To register, go to fccef.org/conference/#register.

“We’re based in Charlotte, and we wanted to recognize the providers and educators, early childhood educators here in Charlotte,” said Vantionette Savage, FCEEF’s president. “The conference overall is about renewing your body, mind and soul, the relaxation to where you can step out of your zone and being with people that look like you and even do the work that you do, not always sitting around giving our energy just to the little ones.”

“We’re going to have folks who are going to provide different wellness practices,” said Wanda Pendergrass FCCEF’s community outreach coordinator. “We’ll have massage. We’re going to have yoga instruction, line dance instruction, a myriad of different kinds of practices that we’re presenting our teachers, so that it may be something that they’ll tap into, that they'll want to adopt for themselves and continue to engage in it throughout the year for their own wellness, because we know that mental health, mental wellness, is an issue in our society and in our world, and so we’re trying to help establish a wellness pattern for the providers.”

In addition to wellness gatherings, the conference includes Wave BootCamp, a forum to familiarize childcare entrepreneurs with the latest business practices and the National Parent Leadership Institute for parents of foundation-affiliated providers. 

Part of the foundation’s mission is to raise awareness of the value of early childhood educators. As business owners who often rely on government funds to hire and retain staff, state expenditures aren’t keeping pace with the cost of sustainability.

In North Carolina, 59% of low-income families who qualify for NC Pre-K, the state-supported early education initiative, are enrolled, leaving thousands of children without its benefit when they enroll in kindergarten. Even when children qualify NC Pre-K, they aren’t guaranteed a spot.

The forum’s mission of centering physical, mental and spiritual renewal and reflection through interactive workshops for professionals in addition to empowering families to advocate for their children’s academic and social well-being. 

“We need to have somebody pour energy back into us, because we’re burned out,” Savage said. “It’s all about giving back from the heart and soul to the providers that we most definitely [are] in need of, because right now, we’re decreasing by the numbers, by the day. We’re losing family childcare home providers. And what we’re trying to do is give them a new avenue, or new want, of why they need to stay.”

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