BACK TO SCHOOL
The school year is off to a great start for Fresno EOC Head Start 0 to 5 with new safety measures in place.
The kids are back on campus at Washington Head Start in Selma, after a year of virtual learning. This year, COVID-19 safety is included in their lesson plans. Classes started August 16, 2021, with masks and stricter sanitizing requirements than ever before.
Esperanza Silva is the Teacher Director of the program in Selma. She says students are required to wear masks inside the classrooms. And for the most part, these little learners are very diligent about keeping their face coverings on, even when playing outside during recess. “We explain, it’s for safety reasons. You need to keep it on and when we come outdoors if they don’t want to use the mask, that’s fine,” said Silva.
The program provides comprehensive child development and family support services, including: education, social, emotional, health, nutrition, family support, and inclusion services.
Silva says the staff is happy to have children back on campus after teaching virtually last year due to the Covid-19 pandemic, and they are taking extra measures to keep them safe. “The toys, the doors, the bathrooms. We are with the spray bottle after they leave and in between breaks. We clean all the time.”
Fresno EOC Head Start 0 to 5 Early Care & Education has two sessions at Washington Head Start each day. Early Care & Education Director Rosa Pineda says, “We look at our Community Needs Assessment to determine what class option each center needs. For Washington Head Start, the community has many children who need our services. Therefore, we want to serve as many children as we can. The center provides services to 40 preschool children through morning and afternoon sessions; each class serves 20 children for three and a half hours per day.”
Students will attend five days a week through the end of the school year in May.
For more information about the Head Start 0 to 5 program, please visit the Head Start 0 to 5 page.