We’re Better Together: Building greatness begins at birth

Mike Tenbusch Vice President of Education United Way for Southeastern Michigan

Here at the United Way, we have a Big Hairy Audacious Goal to make Metro Detroit one of the top five places to work and live by 2030.  Some people think that will never happen. Others think that’s way too far off. But here’s the thing, the graduating high school class of 2030 will be born next year. Our hopes rest with those students becoming one of the most skilled and best-educated graduating classes in the nation. And their future will be shaped largely by how we treat them in the first few years of their lives.

Ninety percent of the brain is developed by the age of three. In those precious, formative years, a child in a low-income home will hear 30 million fewer words by age  four than a child in a middle-income home. This doesn’t mean big words or new words; using  the same nurturing words over and over again form the neural connections that help learning and brain development take place. 

Not only will children in low-income homes hear fewer words, they will receive more discouragement than encouragement than children in more affluent homes. They enter kindergarten unprepared for success and spend most of their school years trying catch up. Most never do.

Our breakthrough strategy for making Detroit a great place to live and work entails ensuring that every child  grows up in a nurturing, literacy-rich environment. Words are to the brain’s development what food is to the body’s. The better intake we have, the better off we are. But unlike food, words don’t cost any money at all.  

What does it mean to have a nurturing, literacy-rich environment? It’s captured in a simple message.

Is someone reading to your child 20 minutes per day five days each week?  

Yes, there are lots of other complex challenges and issues affecting our region, but simple solutions beat complex ones every time.  A relentless commitment to doing this one simple act for all children is how we get better all the time.

This blog post is a reprint from "We're Better Together," a weekly newsletter, authored by Michael Tenbusch, that discusses the current state of education in metro Detroit and beyond. United Way for Southeastern Michigan distributes "We're Better Together" without charge to people with an interest in education. If you are interested in subscribing to We're Better Together, please visit www.LiveUnitedSEM.org/BetterTogether.