Family & Community Adult Education Family Literacy
Massachusetts Family Literacy Consortium

Our vision is successful families. Our mission is successful partnershps.

Pathways to Family Success:
Coordinated Family Literacy and Family Support Pilot Project
Supported by: Verizon Foundation, the Massachusetts Department of Elementary and Secondary Education and the Massachusetts Family Literacy Consortium

Many MFLC member agencies are investing in efforts to increase family access to high-quality comprehensive services by supporting community-wide collaborations. In some cases, the providers work on behalf of a specific population (e.g., children, adults, the unemployed, victims of abuse, etc.). In others, they focus on a specific service (e.g., education, health, family protection, occupational training, etc.).

The pilot project enables these providers to come together with service recipients and local leadership in a broad-based community partnership that bridges the gaps between education, employment, health, and human services. Service providers will identify ways to more fully serve the most vulnerable families. Service recipients will receive the range of services that helps them move along a pathway to family success. The overall goals of the Pathways to Family Success Pilot Project are to help communities:

• establish a comprehensive community-wide partnership that focuses on the whole family and a broad commitment to family and community success. The partnership will include community leaders, education, employment and training, health and human service providers, and other stakeholders;

• build upon existing "coordination and integration" initiatives by bringing these initiatives together to weave their respective services and programs into a comprehensive system of integrated literacy and support services; and

• identify and work to overcome unintended local and state barriers to the comprehensive coordination and integration of services for families in need.

Representing each of five Massachusetts regions, the communities currently participating are:

Greater Boston: Cambridge

Southeastern Massachusetts: Fall River

Central Massachusetts: Leominster

Northeastern Massachusetts: Lawrence

Western Massachusetts: Holyoke

While each community has a plan responsive to its unique characteristics and local priorities, all five will:

• take inventory of completed and in progress assessments of needs and assets developed by partners and others;
• develop a comprehensive community plan for coordinating/integrating early childhood education, school-based education, adult education, parenting and family support, employment services, and health and human services; and
• serve as models for producing better outcomes for families in need by integrating literacy and support services.

The communities will be funded for three years, subject to appropriation, with the possibility of continuing beyond the third year depending upon success and results. Funding for the project illustrates the strength of collaborative partnerships at the state level and the active engagement of a key private sector partner, Verizon. Verizon's partnership with the MFLC is one piece of a national literacy initiative, Verizon Reads.

Archive: Request for Proposals

Please address any questions or comments to MFLC@doe.mass.edu