Patterns & Paradigms | The Pattern Podcast
Patterns & Paradigms | The Pattern Podcast
Season 2 Episode 11: Day One Early Learning Community with Geraldine Laybourne & Julie Riess
What if we began thinking of our earliest childhood educators as brain architects? What if we transform the concept of "childcare" by empowering our teachers so that we can scaffold a child's learning experience to foster creativity, curiosity, and excitement about learning?
This week's episode features Geraldine Laybourne, Founder of Nickelodeon, and Julie Riess, Director of Vassar College’s early childhood laboratory schools, who have joined forces as Co-Founders of DAY ONE Early Learning Community. DAY ONE is an organization with a mission to revitalize Poughkeepsie and Dutchess County by investing in our youngest, supporting workforce development, parent empowerment, and early childhood learning.
We are experiencing a paradigm shift, a fundamental change in the way we usually do things. We are intentionally choosing to see the silver lining opportunity arises. We can shine a light on the things that weren't working well on those things that weren't really working at all, we can regroup reevaluate and re-engineer it's time to explore new patterns and paradigms those that inspire us to rise above the chaos and explore how the conditions of today and take us to a better tomorrow patterns and paradigms the pattern podcast from Hudson Valley pattern for progress. You're listening to season two episode 11 day one early learning community with your host pattern, president and CEO, Jonathan Dropkin.
Speaker 2:Hi everyone, and welcome to patterns and paradigms. We hope you were as inspired as we were from our discussion with Rob Sullivan of Cornell on the current mission to Mars. It really makes you think about what other possibilities are there. Please remember to subscribe to our podcast and take a moment to share an episode with a friend this week's bubble or trend for the first time in seven years, the amount of outstanding credit card debt shrunk in America. That's right during the pandemic, it got smaller. The more likely explanation is the reduction in spending by so many households led to this because people didn't know what they were about to do yet with so many people out of work. Wouldn't you expect that the total amount of charges to credit cards would have grown. One theory is the access to cash that was made possible through the various loan and stimulus programs. Reduce the overall need to use your credit card. Guess we'll have to wait until the report comes out for 2021 to see if this is a bubble or trend. I'm here with my partner at pattern Joe Cheika Hey, Joe, what's happening and where are we heading this week? What a great week we have coming up. We just sent out our acceptance letters to our community Rebuilders class and our bootcamp style program will cover 12 weeks. And it's going to be a lot of learning and sharing of nearly a dozen different projects here in the Hudson Valley. So we're very, very pleased that that's going to be kicking off very soon.
Speaker 3:We're also pleased to bring an amazing organization and an initiative to be presented by two incredible women from the West Elmwood housing development corporation in Providence, Rhode Island for our housing webinar on Thursday, we're going to listen and explore how this community-based organization puts their mission into practice by promoting the development of healthy, sustainable communities through housing development and surf and services. More specifically, we're going to hear about the San COFA initiative itself. It's a model approach to community building that recognizes the importance of using knowledge from the past to achieve progress by addressing modern health and financials in community challenges, through increased access to healthy foods that are traditional to the West end neighborhoods, ethnically diverse community. I'm really excited about this one because we've got so many similarities between what they're doing and what some of our smaller community-based organizations are doing right here in the Hudson Valley. So there's a lot to be learned a lot to be shared, and this event is actually going to be live this month. So we're going to have real time question and answer capabilities during this event. Very exciting. And so that that's, what's really going on this week. Um, I'm very, very curious. Where did Duke land in the college tournament this year? Well,
Speaker 2:Thanks, Joe. I really appreciate you bringing that up. You would have to go back 25 years before my son was born to find a year that Duke didn't make the tournament. That's right. I'm looking at filling out my brackets and I can't pick Duke to win the whole thing 25 years ago, but thanks, Joe really appreciate you bringing that one up two and a half
Speaker 3:Decades. Can't go wrong.
Speaker 2:Today's show. Um, we're really excited about a new program in Poughkeepsie, New York called day one, it's focused on early childhood education. It is spearheaded by two Vassar college alum, Geraldine, Laybourne, and alum, and currently a trustee who is also the founder of Nickelodeon. And Julie recently was in charge of Vassar colleges, early childhood laboratory for 25 years together. They are trying to make a difference in the lives of the youngest in Poughkeepsie and Duchess County, as they forge a program to Kindle learning in the earliest stages of childhood. So hi Geraldine and hi, Julie. Thanks for joining
Speaker 4:Us. Um, how are you both doing Julie? You go first. Well, um, we're, we're doing well, uh, you know, managing through the usual stuff that COVID has brought, but it is also, um, really given us, uh, forced us to be innovative, um, and to try new things and, um, you know, and Julie, by us, you're currently a, uh, still teaching at Vassar. Um, actually I've just retired. Um, and I'm now the executive director to day one, but in the fall semester, when we reopened, uh, the early childhood school at Vassar, we moved outside. Um, literally we moved outside into intimidate tense and, you know, um, we weren't sure how that would go. And, uh, but we learned, we learned a lot. We learned about things that we maybe don't want to do again, but we also learned some really cool things that we want to continue and to expand on and actually, and to bring into day one as well. You know, it's funny. I think back to when I was in college, I remember it would be like a beautiful spring day and all the students would go to the TG. Can we meet, can we sit outside or something, but I don't think you want to do that on a regular basis. It kind of, you know, it was a special treat and Geraldine, how are you doing?
Speaker 5:I'm doing great. Um, I think like Julie it's forced me to operate differently. I used to commute to New York three days a week, and now I'm just focused in Duchess County on day one. And I'm not endlessly on a train I'm concentrating on, uh, the most important thing I've ever worked on. And, and also, Oh, I will say I've been married 50, 51 years. And I think I've spent more time with my husband in the last year than the prior 50.
Speaker 4:I am not going to go near that one. So let me, let me, okay. Let me just establish, uh, your backgrounds, because I think that both very, very important to this whole day one project. So Geraldine, let's start with you because you have quite the experience, but very different and no less important than Julie's you just come at this very differently.
Speaker 5:Well, for me, um, I am a typical second child who gets, uh, fuel from people telling me that my thinking big is hopeless. And I think you relate to that Jonathan as well. Yes, I do. But, um, you know, when I was a school teacher and very concerned about how the media looked down at kids and condescended and, uh, gave them stupid stories, and if it was noisy and colorful, they thought it was good enough. And I had all kinds of theories. I did crazy research. And then I landed in a job in the early days of cable. And I got to shape a business, which by the way, every presentation people laughed at me, kids business wasn't the, that was an oxymoron. And, um, we proved them wrong in every way. We created a big business based on listening to kids, respecting them, getting them the best creative folks we could. And, and also I think just managing a business where we had so many different people with so many different talents, it's like part of what Dooley does is reflective. So supervision. I felt like to think that's what I did with my people too. And being actually, uh, trained in, in, uh, elementary education as I was, that's the perfect training for every CEO. You know, you learn how to manage your boss, you learn how to manage your customers. But, um, listening hard is I think my biggest gift
Speaker 4:Well, and, and I don't know if you're you're, you know, we can, you, it was Nickelodeon, right? Yeah. Yeah. And, and so it's no small business that we're talking about and a woman who managed to develop it years ago when it wasn't so easy for a woman to break into the CEO status. So these are quite significant, um, accomplishments in your background and understanding, you know, how to teach or conceptually, but Julie you've been, you know, you say you just retired, but 25, 26 years, how long were you at Basser doing early? Was it all in the early childhood? Yeah. Okay. It was, yeah. So I was, uh, in my role as director for 26 and a half years. Um, but I'm also a Vassar grad and I did my initial training. And when primer in the nursery school at Vassar, uh, as my very first teaching experience after college, um, so I've actually spent more than half my life there, um, as, as part of that community and in one way or another, um, I'm a developmental psychologist. I, uh, came to working in early childhood and teaching because I wanted to understand how and why we're doing what we're doing as teachers. Why do we do a certain way to, uh, influence or encourage the best development and education for children, um, as compared to another way, uh, and really that's kind of a mixed field of developmental psychology and, um, educational practices. And I, my career has really been at the intersection of those two things. All right. So we've got two very impressive backgrounds. How did you collide and decide that day one, which I'll let you explain what day one is. People are always interested. Where did the idea come from and how did the two of you decide to do this together? I get the Vassar connection, but how did this all come about?
Speaker 5:Well, I have been a long, uh, admirer of whim farmer. I mean, it's one of the oldest lab schools in the country. It was started in 1920 and 29, I think. And, um, I have been interested in Poughkeepsie since I graduated in 1969. I thought I was going to be an architect and a city planner, and believe me, I mapped out every block and Poughkeepsie, and there was a lot more vibrancy on main street before the arterials, before all the destruction of the neighborhoods downtown. So I've always been in love with Poughkeepsie and I've always seen its potential. And I spent some time with mass design, Michael Murphy, who is a native son of Poughkeepsie. I met him in 2016 or 17, and I met, uh, Rob Dyson through Michael and Rob was kind of glazing over as I was talking about what I thought was great about Poughkeepsie and what we needed to do for kids. And I realized I had just one opportunity to get his attention. And I said, here's what I want to do. I want to provide a Vassar education free to every kid and in Poughkeepsie. And he said, now that's interesting. That's interesting. And so a couple weeks later I was at an event and I made a beeline for Julie and at least that's my memory duly. Does that sound right? That's good. And I, and I was very, uh, timid with her because I had this grand plan that definitely in included her and I couldn't, um, turn her off. I had to make sure she, she wanted to, to do it because it's nothing without her. So that's, I was a little nervous Dooley that's. Okay.
Speaker 4:Now, now wait, let Julie, one second. Let's just explain who Rob Dyson is. Rob Dyson is the head of the largest foundation in the Hudson Valley, a very successful businessmen, no small feat getting his attention and then getting his interest. So over to you, Julie. So, um, yep. Jerry, Jerry found me, um, we had met a few times before it, that sort of, you know, reception kinds of events at the college over the years, but clearly I could tell, um, in the beginning of our conversation that this was something different we were going to talk about. And, um, you know, she said, she's a good listener and that's exactly what happened. She just let me talk, you know, what would it look like if we could do an amazing early childhood program for the city of Poughkeepsie? What if we could turn a whim primer like education into every kid in the city of Poughkeepsie. And I thought I was just having this great conversation dreaming away here. Um, and then, um, Jerry said, well, I think we're mind melding. And I, I've never forgotten that mind, melding. And boy, that is a lot what it's like. Um, it's a complimentary mind-meld. And about two months later, we were off and running. The summer was coming and we dove into Poughkeepsie and started talking to people to find out, um, you know, what were their perceptions and what did they think he gives he needed for early childhood? So let, let's just go back again because we're, I'm laying a foundation for what you have done. So when primer is at Vassar, what is it when primer is at Vassar? Um, it is, uh, an early childhood, what we call a laboratory nursery school. So what that means is that we're a teacher education and research site. We have young children there who are going to school, um, but all of the adults, the teachers in the building and the student teachers in the building, uh, the college students are, um, all working on how to create best practice, um, or how to research best practice so that we can innovate and try new things, uh, like moving outside for instance. Um, so it's, it's, uh, it's different than being in, um, you know, a standard, uh, nursery school or another early childhood setting because there is this very high value place that everybody's a learner, um, in that situation, not just the kids, but every, every person in the building is coming in to learn and to think about, um, early childhood and the best practice that we can create. So there's been a lot of, uh, political debate over the years for funding for early childhood education. Why
Speaker 6:Don't you explain just what that means? Because, you know, we could say K through 12 and that's kindergarten, but that's not what early childhood education. Okay. So why don't we explain a bit more about it? I, I have some understanding from the Montessori school approach, but let's just start from the beginning. What is early childhood education and why is it so important?
Speaker 4:So early childhood education, um, currently is defined as birth to eight age eight, meaning, um, babies through second grade, uh, is about the right parameter. And only recently in the last five to 10 years, have we had a degree where you can certify in what's called[inaudible], um, before that it was elementary education or secondary education. There wasn't anything for early childhood education. And there really isn't still, I mean, that's a very, very small slice of the pie. Um, early childhood is, uh, the critical years of brain development. Um, when I go on and do workshops, I sometimes talk to the early childhood teachers and say, you know, um, you've got the wrong title. And they say, look at me skeptically and say, well, what are you talking about? And I said, you're not teachers, you're brain architects. And I mean that they, everything that they do all day long, whether it's an interaction, whether it's how they've designed the curriculum, whether it's how they're directing a child to solve a problem for themselves, all of that is building thousands and millions of brain connections for that child. Um, and it is, it is a skill, it's a profession, it's an art form, um, to be, and it's an honor to be working with very young children. It looks different than when you're an elementary or secondary school, but it is no less important. And in fact, I would argue is the most important time that we can be educating kids.
Speaker 6:So I, I will tell you that. And I've said this to Geraldine before that the little that I know about it is from my children, my son, and daughter's experience at a Montessori school. And they were there for two years of pre-K and then K, and then first and second grade to this day, my son and daughter will say that it is then that they were taught how to think. And the creativity all happened back then. And they traced it. They're not this isn't. So
Speaker 4:You mind if we get them on tape,
Speaker 6:But if you get, if you, if you gel, if you can get them to do it, they might listen to you, but it may be a little different covering for me, but they have both said it and they would love to do it, but okay. So day one let's let's
Speaker 4:Let, okay. So
Speaker 5:Let me just add something to what Julie, because there's been so much work done in the field economist, James Heckman, a Nobel prize winning economist has studied this for decades, and it is such a drain on our society that we don't support early, early learning. He can, he can show that in most cities, if you spend$1 on, uh, early learning, you can save, uh,$13 later on through remediation or, or if kids go to jail, I heard a statistic this weekend that really shocked me. They people planning prisons in jails, look at the rate of where kids are in the fourth grade, and they can predict how many Gail cells they need. Well, you know, we, we are very much about social justice and racial equality and, um, trying to end generational poverty. And, uh, Poughkeepsie is a perfect place to do this because of the size, because there are only 1200 kids, zero to five in Poughkeepsie and conduct his County. There are 13,000. So, you know, we can actually the course of our program train 200 teachers in Duchess County and reach 62% of all the kids in the County that is remarkable. Other projects have had, um, less geography involved in what they're trying to do.
Speaker 4:I think this is ambitious, but it is doable. As you say, you know, you could talk about a whole city or County, but you are, you are talking about, we could do this with the appropriate resources to address all children and create an entirely new model. Um, how does day one though, you know, differ, let's say from a Montessori or other programs, how have you designed this and why you so excited about the day one model? So it's a little bit of a complicated question. Um, what we're trying to do in day one is design a curriculum for teaching teachers that incorporates a lot of different perspectives. And that includes a Montessori approach. That includes a Reggio approach, um, that includes working with headstart teachers and, uh, that model in the classroom. But there's some core pieces underneath that are fundamental. One is social, emotional learning. It's thinking not as much about ABCs and one, two threes as it is about how does a child learn self-regulation how do they learn to take the perspective of someone else and manage their own emotions when they're in conflict with another person? Um, how do they learn to make a connection between two ideas or two things that have happened? Um, so that they see something that's a third thing that's new, that's innovative. Um, how do they learn to critically problem solve and evaluate the evidence? Um, I know this sounds a little heady for, for, you know, babies to five-year-olds, but it's absolutely not. It's the foundation of how they learn to do this in a more sophisticated way as they get older and the problem with getting to fourth grade and then, you know, kind of taking a look at what's happening here is that we need that foundation not to come in, starting in third and fourth grade. We need that foundation to come in before they start kindergarten, because that's when their brains are getting wired up. That's when they were laying the, the way in which they're going to think about information inside their brain is getting set down by how we actually structure and teach that, um, with them. And so the model for day one is, uh, you know, is, is blending a lot of things, but it's also this focus on helping them to empower the teachers, to think about each child individually so that they know where they need to go for their next step. How do we scaffold every child's learning experience so that they're getting what they need and that they move then their next step forward in their own learning and development. What a great word to use, how do we scaffold their learning development is that it is, you know, I just sort of thought of the imagery as you were saying, and I'm great way to describe it. Um, okay. So 200 teachers, where, where are we going to find, how are we going to scale up to 200 teachers? Is it, there is a doable, what are we going to do to get this, you know, large and large, but I'm going to say manageable. I love tasks like this, but what are we going to do?
Speaker 5:Dutchess community college is a magnificent resource in our area. As you know, what we found was that many kids who, sorry, many students who want to study child development and early learning, um, get derailed. They become bank tellers because they can't make a proper living as a childcare worker. I mean, we're on a campaign to end the word childcare and to give the human beings who are shaping our kids, the proper title. I don't know if we can say brain architect. I love architects, so that's cool, but they might think we're putting them in some kind of machine. Well,
Speaker 6:Geraldine brain architect fits with scaffolding. So I kinda like where this is. This is kind of interesting.
Speaker 5:Anybody, you know, they're going to be profound teachers. And I just wanted to add one thing that is similar about Nickelodeon and day one, we lived by the word that, uh, play is the brain's favorite way of learning. And that is Dooley's motto. We didn't know that that was our motto at Nickelodeon. We just said, play, learn, grow. But, um, learning is immensely fun. And for you watch a little kid trying to figure out what a toothbrushes and you know, it's just a gas, so it's intentional play. And it's getting the scaffolding that Julie is building is scaffolding for parents, scaffolding for teachers, scaffolding for kids. And it takes a whole community. We're just in the process of writing a grant and we're titling the grant all rights. We need to rise. We need the business community to rise. We need parents to rise. We need teachers to rise. We need, you know, and so far in Poughkeepsie, everybody's been supportive. This, the superintendent of schools wants us to do some pre-K classrooms. Uh, the Duchess community college wants us to have our pilot there in addition to wimp climber. And, you know, it's, it's so magnificent to see Poughkeepsie putting kids first, you know, the under I, sorry, I'm going everywhere. But when Julie and I had our first, what's our mission, our mission is by 2030, that when anybody says Poughkeepsie, people are gonna say, Oh, that's that city that loves his kids. Okay. What a great goal city that loves its kids. So, um, we've come a long way since then, but that's always in my heart.
Speaker 6:That's a, just a tremendous statement. And could you imagine the marketing around it that, you know, this is a place where we want to live, not just because we liked the city or the, uh, you know, the various elements of, uh, being there, but that their education system is quite unique starting with early childhood education. Um, you know, in perusing the website, there is this section there, um, which caught me, uh, which caught my attention. There were just the, the littlest of things. And it says, um, every day brain play, do you update that every day?
Speaker 5:We don't do it every day because we're brand new and we, we only one employee, but we do have a library. And actually I spoke to, um, a friend, who's gonna make sure that we're rotating the brain play every day.
Speaker 6:And the premise behind it is to give it what, uh, something very simple.
Speaker 5:And it's, you know, honestly we see it as a national campaign and we tried to get NBA players to do this everyday brain play. I mean, I'll just give you one example. These are all duly and Dooley teacher led ideas, but here's one, imagine Steph Curry with his kid and the kid takes one of Steph Curry's sneakers and his dad lives down on the floor. And he, um, measures how many sneakers tall Steph Curry is. And then his toddler lies down and Steph takes his little shoe and measures how many shoes high he is. And, you know, we don't know who's taller, whether it's Steph Curry. So we want more parents to be playing. We want them all. This is now I'm going to go off, off topic. But when I walked down the street and see everybody focused on their telephone and their screens and not looking at their kids, we have a mission to get people back playing and looking at their kids. Of course, people love them, want the best for their kids, but we just want to spark some crazy fun play.
Speaker 6:So I wasn't, until you mentioned Steph Perry, I have to say that, you know, I just turned 65 and my son gave me a subscription to masterclass. And, and that's because I think you never stop learning. And the very first one I did since I've been playing basketball, my whole life was Steph Curry on basketball. And it is truly amazing. Um, as now I, I did, uh, the outliers, uh, Malcolm Gladwell. Yes. You know, so, so the notion that a 65 year old could be taught new things or a very young person, we can rethink, how do we teach them to make them inquisitive, creative, excited by that. Right. I think this is just, this is just awesome. So, okay. Um, there's another children's initiative in Poughkeepsie. It's known as the children's cabinet and Julie, you're the subcommittee chair for the early childhood working group. That's right. So someone did their homework and linked the two together. Uh, how, how did this come about? And it goes right to your point, Geraldine, how someone is thinking about Poughkeepsie and education in a very different way, mean I'm gonna have Jerry start with laying out the children's cabinet. Cause that comes first. And then we can talk about the early childhood.
Speaker 5:So, um, we, we have a, uh, very good relationship with the mayor. And, um, when we got a new superintendent of schools, we saw this as an opportunity to get the community focused around children. And we have so many great local, um, heroes and Patriots and people who grew up in Poughkeepsie. Rob Watson is that the Harvard ed school redesign lab and he and Michael Murphy and mass design and Chris kroner and James Watson, all, we all got together and said, let's form a children's cabinet in Poughkeepsie. And so Julie and I went to Harvard, a whole group of us went, uh, Ellen Gambino went, um, just Neville Smyth, just everybody who's been concerned with kids, Nicole, Finchell you it? And we spent two days there learning about children's cabinets. There are 40 in the country. And, um, we were the first one in New York state. We, we started in February, I'm on the executive committee, there are 35 on the executive committee. And if you can imagine how fantastic it was to start in February of 2020, because we had people at the table who care about kids. And so when the school system had to go, um, online, there were no, there was not enough conductivity and not enough Chromebooks. And the children's cabinet brought that to everybody's attention. And within days we had raised enough money to buy Chromebooks and, uh, Nubian directions started a wifi business. And, you know, it was just, was so impressive to that. We had our own mechanism for talking about COVID and how we were going to get food people. And, uh, and the mayor and the superintendent are daily buddies now, which I don't think has ever been true in Poughkeepsie. I don't know my history is not that long.
Speaker 4:No, it, it I'd say that's a pretty safe, uh, comment, you know, especially given some of the history of Poughkeepsie's school district and you know, how a lot of the was, um, white flight that left the inner city, um, to go to a different school district. But the mayor Rob Rollison, who's a good friend, um, collaborating with the school district superintendent is different and it is, uh, it's great that it's happening. All right, Julie. Oh, I'm sorry. Go ahead.
Speaker 5:So just one more thing, recognizing that a kid's life is 24 hours a day, and only a portion of that is in school is, you know, a really important step for Poughkeepsie. Um, but, but the other thing is that other children's cabinets of these 40 children's cabinets, they often begin with early learning because that is where the biggest impact can be made from not to bank upon on our name from day one. So Julie, who is the expert in this field was drafted to be the co-chair of the early learning breakout group, but it's not just our community that recognizes this as the biggest need. It's all over the country.
Speaker 4:All right, Julie, it sounds like, uh, Geraldine's teed you up. Tell us about how this, how, how, how does this meld together? So there, the way the cabinet has designed it is there's going to be four subgroups. One of which is, um, early learning. And we are just in our kickoff phase. We're about to have our first full group meeting a couple of weeks from now. Um, the goal of the early learning, uh, sub working group is to bring in as many different voices as we can from the city of Poughkeepsie and very nearby, um, and to, uh, ha have some tough conversations really think about what is it that we need, what is it that we're not getting for our kids? And, and what's our dream of what that would look like if we could put it all together. Um, and there'll be, there'll be several series of those kinds of conversations among the working group. And then we will come up with recommendations, um, from that, that we will bring back to the children's cabinet, the full cabinet, uh, and say, okay, here's our top three recommendations and the broader width of the children's cabinet representation we'll then, um, collaborate. And, and we'll all dig in together and think about, okay, what could we actually do here?
Speaker 5:The, um, the, I'll just say one other benefit of the children's cabinet. So the Benjamin center at a SUNY new Paltz is going to back up the subgroups with research and data and, um, and also, you know, Carmen Smallwood and what she's doing. So it's, it, it literally takes all of us to get this going. And it's really wonderful to see Vassar's been incredibly generous. Just community college has been incredibly, incredibly generous. The, uh, Jean Wagner at the, um, Putnam and Duchess childcare council is, you know, just fantastic, but it takes everybody.
Speaker 4:And, um, the County executive in his 2020 state of the county's speech said that he was going to be providing funds to create a pilot program at one time or nursery. And, and what's the status of that. Obviously COVID got in the way of everything, but how are we doing it, did get in the way, and we're pushing it back out of the way. Um, so we are starting our first pilot program. Um, April 6th, it's coming right around the corner and we will run two pilots this year, one in April and one again in August. Um, and these are for six apprentice teachers, um, in each group, each, each, uh, each cohort, um, that we will bring in. And, and literally we start, start from scratch, you know, run the curriculum through the first time. Um, they will be at whim primer or the infant toddler center in the first cohort in the morning for five hours. And then they come down to our office on main street for two and a half hours and do, um, what's called reflective supervision and, uh, content learning and, and practice and preparation for the next day. So it's, it's 10 weeks of all in, um, full immersion into the world of early childhood and into building relationships with one another in that cohort. Um, as we move forward, we hope that we're going to be able to expand the classrooms that we can put our teachers in. Um, as we kind of learn through this pilot process, and then the cohorts will slowly increase in size that we do, um, every 10 weeks. And although most of the listeners are in the Hudson Valley. I'll just describe finally at the end, I probably should have started here is Poughkeepsie is a post-industrial city and, um, suffered many of the, um, issues of white flight, urban poor, um, lack of investment in its city. And it is doing a really nice job, but slow in terms of rebuilding itself. And clearly what you're attempting to do with day one is just a fabulous, um, addition to the full array of efforts that are going on in the city of Poughkeepsie. So if someone wanted to support your efforts day one, um, whether that was financial or in some other way, what should they do? They should definitely go to our website, um, which is day one, early learning.org. And, uh, you can donate there. You can contact us. Um, you can learn more about what the community, um, can, can do to help us as we're growing. We also want to encourage people to go to that website who are interested in becoming apprentice teachers. Our applications are up as of today, and we are anxious to have our first few cohorts, um, start to come together and, and really, uh, really delve in and have this experience. Geraldine. I never want to not give you the last word, but is there something else that I've left out or you'd like to talk mention here,
Speaker 5:I'd like to give credit to the community of Poughkeepsie for embracing us. Um, the County executive, we are looking forward to approval from the common council in Poughkeepsie and the legislature and the County legislature for Eastman, uh, campus, which is a, uh, beautiful old park with a derelict building on it. And day one will be one of the anchor tenants there. And that's where our building will go. One of the things we learned from COVID is we have to plan for outdoor learning and we have to bundle those little kids up and make sure they get lots of fresh air. So I give a tremendous amount of credit to Chris kroner and the mass design group. They are approaching planning community development from the inside out, not like a lot of the gentrification that has happened in sister cities, beacon, and Hudson. This is about how do we help people that are here right now? How do we keep young families wanting to live in this area? It's, there's so much richness in the Hudson Valley. And we truly believe that the fantastic old buildings in Poughkeepsie have so much promise, but we have take care of our community as we rebuild our, our, um, our city. I'd also say that we look forward to the business community, not saying, Oh, there's too long, a payback in early learning the day that a businessman does not say that to be, will be a happy day. They have to say, we can't afford not to do this.
Speaker 6:Um, I think you've got it exactly right. Um, journey Laybourne, Julie Reese. Thank you so much for joining me. I do want to say that, um, Michael Murphy from mass design had been a prior guest on patterns and paradigms. So if you're interested in learning more about mass design, you can go look for that prior episode. Thank you both very much.
Speaker 5:Thank you for tuning in to patterns and paradigms the pattern podcast. For more information about this episode, visit our website pattern for progress.org forward slash podcast.
Speaker 6:[inaudible].