2012-327 Arts - Chapel Hill Carrboro Children's Museum $1,500

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Orange County Head Start/Early Head Start Chapel MU Th"Wg-Ommch Project,Inc. • 800 Eaatowne Drive,Salta 105 Chapel Hill,North Carolina 27514 Telephone:(919)490-5577 Ext:242 Fax:(919)490-4905 www.chtopcom May 1,2012 Orange County Arts Commission P.O.Box 1177 110 E.King Street Hillsborough,NC 27278 To the Members of the Arts Commission: I am very excited to provide a Ietter of support for Kidzu Children's Museum from the Orange County Head Start and Early Head Start(OCHS/EHS)of the Chapel Hill Training Outreach Project to continue and enhance their project with us. Kidzu's grant proposal outlines a program series that directly supports our mission,providing artistic and educational experiences for young children. We were very excited to welcome local artist Jeannette Brossart and the Kidzu facilitator to our More at Four Head Start Pre-K partner classrooms this past year. Our Fairview Center serves 72 children between the ages of infancy and three years old. Our Pre-K classrooms serve four year olds with 18 in each of three elementary school classrooms across the Orange County School District. OCHS/EHS is a comprehensive child development program providing services to families who are in need because they are living at or below the federal poverty guidelines or are eligible because of the special needs of their child. We offer both home based and center-based options and over half of our enrolled children are dual language learners-learning in English and in their home languages which for our population are Spanish and Burmese languages. Our Head Start and Early Head Start programs have also been visiting Kidzu for several years as participants in the museum's free field trip program for children and families in need. Our children,families,teachers,and staff greatly enjoy these visits.We believe that Kidzu is an outstanding educational resource for our community and value the hands-on learning experiences Kidzu provides the children and families we serve. Our families have certainly benefited from Kidzu's programs and services,as have many other local families in need through Kidzu's free field trips,Free Sundays,and other initiatives. I look forward to expanding Orange County Head Start and Early Head Start's collaborations with Kidzu on the continued artistic outreach program. This program will provide the children we serve with a unique opportunity to work with a professional artist and exercise their own creative skills. It is also very exciting to know that the children's creative mosaic art that will eventually become part of our new museum space atop Wallace Parking Deck! I hope you will give this proposal your strongest consideration. Yours sincerely, t Angela Wilcox,Director f Orange County Head Start and Early Head Start of the Chapel Hill Training Outreach Project