There’s an old shopping mall in the Midtown neighborhood of Jackson, Miss. It opened in 1970, fell on hard times in the 1980s, and turned triumphantly into a healthcare complex in the 1990s. Today, you’ll find everything from a dialysis clinic and a dentist to a Piccadilly Cafeteria and a university administrative office.
Also there, taking up just a few thousand of the more than half million square feet in the mall: one of the most amazing early childhood education centers I’ve ever seen!
Global Connection Learning Center: Truly a Model Site
As LENA’s partnerships director in the Southeast, I had the pleasure of visiting Global Connection Learning Center in January of this year. A grant from W.K. Kellogg Foundation via the Community Foundation for Mississippi had given us the opportunity to showcase Global Connection as a model LENA Grow site. Over the span of five weeks, it became a destination for early education leaders and advocates from all over Mississippi. They came to see LENA Grow in action:
- What is this professional development program all about?
- How does it blend into a center’s daily routines?
- What does it do for a classroom’s language environment? For a teacher’s confidence? For a child’s enthusiasm? For a parent’s sense of connection?
- How can hard data — just numbers — inspire the best from educators?
We were all treated to a picture-perfect look at what early childhood education is all about!
Inside Two of Mississippi’s Best Early Childhood Classrooms
My time at Global Connection wasn’t just a visit. It was an experience.
I came ready to be truly present. And I left with a full heart. Here’s what I saw:
To me, these pictures tell a real story of exactly what high-quality early childhood education looks like. And then there was the community woven into the center itself. The culture. I could tell that relationships had been intentionally. Turn by turn, interaction by interaction, every single day.
The children were excited to wear their LENA “eggs.” And I 100% believe that sense of ownership over their own learning experience is a direct reflection of the culture Nancy Sylvester has built at Global Connection since 2010, after a long career with Jackson Public Schools.
And that culture — the kind you can feel the moment you walk in the door — is exactly what Mississippi is working to build statewide.
ELEVATE Mississippi
Exciting things are underway in Mississippi.
The new quality support system, ELEVATE, promises personalized support for early childhood professionals. Mississippi’s badging system replaces the star ratings familiar to most states. The beauty of this system is that it really digs into what we mean when we talk about “quality.”
Year by year, early education programs earn badges. These badges show that a program has excelled in one specific component of child care quality. The first year of the ELEVATE badging system focuses specifically on what we here at LENA consider to be the heart and soul of quality early childhood education: teacher-child interactions.
Right now, we’re mapping out how LENA Grow’s future in Mississippi may take shape. And we’re watching states like New Mexico, Florida, Nebraska, Indiana, and Arkansas weave LENA Grow into their culture of quality early education. As LENA Grow keeps scaling in breadth, it’s so inspiring to see the deep impact it can have on the children and teachers at this one amazing site in Jackson.
I’m feeling so motivated and so hopeful. Thank you, Global Connection Learning Center!
