Partnerships
Early Head Start Child Care Partnership (EHS CCP)
As part of Next Door’s outreach into the community, the agency leads a federal grant program working to increase access to high quality early childhood education for Milwaukee families. The grant program started in 2015 featuring an Early Head Start Child Care Partnership (CCP). Today, CCP spans nine early childhood organizations with 11 sites across Milwaukee County.
Next Door deploys a team of instructional coaches at each site, offering teachers mentorship and professional development to help raise the quality of learning and care in their classroom. The CCP program also provides Next Door Family Advocates who work closely with families to ensure they have access to important community resources like medical and dental screenings.
This partnership program allows Next Door to directly reach 330 children across 60 classrooms and indirectly impact 1,400 additional children at the partner sites.
The partners include:
COA Youth and Family Centers
Found in 1906, COA serves Milwaukee children and families with centers in the Riverwest, Harambee and Amani neighborhoods. The agency focuses on a continuum of care for children, from early childhood education to teen programs, and offers home-based parent support services. Next Door is partnering with COA at its Riverwest and Burke locations.
Elaine Schreiber Child Development Center
Elaine Schreiber Child Development Center is a childcare center serving infants, toddlers, preschool, and school-age students. Lessons and activities foster cognitive development, early reading skills, and communication. Before and after school program provides school-age children with access to development activities, drug and violence prevention programs, art, music, counseling, recreation programs, character activities, and technology education courses.
JO's Learning Academy
JO’s Learning Academy opened in Milwaukee in 1967. Today, the agency has two school locations in the Uptown neighborhood on the northwest side and the Layton Boulevard neighborhood on the south side. JO’s programming ranges from Early Head Start to after school and summer activities for older children. Next Door is partnering with JO's at its south side school.
La Causa
La Causa opened in 1972 on Milwaukee’s south side. The agency’s programming includes bilingual early childhood education, a K4-8th grade charter school and a family resource center with parenting support. Next Door is partnering with La Causa at its West Greenfield Avenue location.
Mailaika Early Learning Center
Mailaika Early Learning Center has served children in Milwaukee’s Harambee neighborhood since 2003. Programming at its West Auer Avenue site includes infant care through third grade.
Neighborhood House
Neighborhood House has served Milwaukee children and families since 1945 on the city’s West Side. The agency offers a wide range of community service programming, from early childhood education to support for refugee families. Next Door is partnering with Neighborhood House at its main site along West Richardson Place.
St. Joseph Academy
St. Joseph Academy, affiliated with the Felician Sisters, has served Milwaukee’s children on the South Side since 1907. The agency began as an orphanage, and today offers educational programming ranging from infants to 6th grade at its West Oklahoma Avenue location.
Train Up A Child Learning Center
Train Up A Child Learning Center LLC is a Licensed Family Child Care in Milwaukee WI, with a maximum capacity of 8 children. The home-based daycare service helps with children in the age range of 6 Week(s) - 13 Year(s). The provider does not participate in a subsidized child care program.
YMCA
The YMCA of Metropolitan Milwaukee works to create a healthier, stronger and safer city through a variety of center-based educational and recreational programs for the entire family. Next Door is partnering with the YMCA at two of its locations, YMCA Northwest and YMCA Northside.
Strategic Collaborations
Next Door collaborates with the following organizations to offer valuable resources and programming that enhance the high quality early childhood education experience for our children and families.
Educare
Next Door joined the Educare Learning Network in 2005 with the opening of the Educare Milwaukee school. The network of 25 schools nationwide offers a best practice, research-driven model for high quality early childhood education for children from under-resourced families. We have since spread the Educare model across our entire early childhood programming. The Buffett Early Childhood Fund and Start Early are two principal partners of this network.
Children's Wisconsin
Next Door collaborates with Children’s Wisconsin to help improve access to medical and dental care in one of the neighborhoods we serve. In 2011, Children’s Hospital opened a full-service clinic at our 29th Street campus. The clinic, called Next Door Pediatrics, offers services to our families as well as the community at large.
Marquette University
Next Door collaborates with Marquette University on research including the effectiveness of mindfulness programming on children. The 414 Fellows program from AmeriCorps and Serve Wisconsin features Marquette students serving in Next Door classrooms for a school year supporting teachers with language and literacy development for children. Marquette is also a key player in the Next Step Clinic described below.
Medical College of Wisconsin
The Medical College of Wisconsin School of Pharmacy runs a community-based health screening and care referral service at Next Door’s Family Success Center. The program opened in 2019 with MCW faculty and pharmacy students offering services for Next Door children and families, staff and neighborhood residents. In addition, MCW supports Next Door with staff trainings and family engagement programs.
Milwaukee Public Schools
Next Door operates a full-day K4/K5 Charter School in collaboration with Milwaukee Public Schools. We began this program in 2005 at our 29th Street location and expanded it to our Capitol Drive location in the fall of 2016. The partnership includes MPS support for Next Door students with special needs, field trips and training for Next Door teachers.
Next Step Clinic
The Next Step Clinic opened in 2019 as part of Next Door’s Family Success Center. Led by community partners Mental Health America of Wisconsin and Marquette University, the clinic offers high quality mental health and developmental services for Next Door families and residents from underserved areas in Milwaukee. The clinic's team includes licensed psychologists, graduate students in psychology and family navigators.
University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee
Next Door partners with University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee to support student assessments across our early childhood programming. Their research provides us with critical data to evaluate our learning experiences for children. University professors and graduate students participate in the research, which has included studies of literacy concepts like letter naming, vocabulary words and rhyming, and social emotional learning through reading.