January 29, 2018
Thank you for your generosity in donating gifts and time to UAMS Head Start/Early Head Start. We are grateful for the overwhelming support you have shown us. We could not do the work we do with families on our own. It takes the community. Your contributions of toys and clothing allowed us to provide gifts and necessities to 848 children ages 6 weeks to 5 years old at 14 sites within Pulaski County. Families have expressed tremendous appreciation for the gifts their children received. In addition to gifts for children, some people were able to sponsor entire families by providing gifts and necessities for all family members living in the house. A mother came to our office to get the gifts and was overwhelmed with joy. Cars were filled with gifts for families. You truly have been a blessing to our families this holiday season.
UAMS Head Start/Early Head Start program is a quality early childhood program that serves children and their families in the areas of education, health, nutrition, disabilities, mental health and social serves. To date, we service 128 infant and toddlers and 720 three to five year olds. We have also begun a childcare partnership that allows us to serve 40 additional infants and toddlers in community through childcare centers.
For the past eighteen years, UAMS has worked with key stakeholders within our community to assist families in obtaining a quality early childhood experience in efforts to prepare children for school readiness. These community collaborations have contributed to bringing families new experiences, resources and support in an overall effort of preparing children for success in school and beyond. Our primary objective is to teach, heal, search and serve the community while promoting growth and development of preschool children and strengthening families.
One of the cornerstones of our success has been our ability to build partnerships. We are a federally funded program and providing holiday gifts is beyond our capacity. Many of our sponsors this year were repeat sponsors; we sincerely appreciate your continued support and advocacy of our program throughout the years. For all our new sponsors, we look forward to your participation in future years. We could not have completed this project without your partnership and willingness to help.
If you have an interest in assisting our program throughout the year, we would be happy to speak with you about opportunities for donations and volunteering. Thank you again for your support! We hope you found the experience to be as meaningful and memorable as our staff, children and families did.
Sincerely,
Rebecca Pecor Tyra Larkin
Stuff the Stockings Coordinator Program Director
rlpecor@uams.edu tmlarkin@uams.edu
501-526-7645 501-570-5000