PUEBLO, Colo. — Isabel Valencia stands in her living room setting up a makeshift tennis serve from materials she had prepared. She is a chair attached to a green balloon for the ball and a paper plate for the racket.
She blows balloons at her home's visitor, Mayra Ocampo, and they pass the balloons back and forth, counting them each time they return, giving them encouragement and laughing at their mistakes.
The moment Valencia tries the same activity with his 4-year-old daughter Celeste is likely to be light and playful, as it will likely be later this week. But Ocampo carefully explains what's going on beneath the surface. They don't just play tennis. They are developing social skills. They are studying hand-eye coordination. And they are practicing repair.
![tennis Home visitors and parents play a makeshift game of tennis.](https://edsurge.imgix.net/uploads/photo/image/10797/Home_Visit_Tennis-1716413429.png?w=216&h=162&auto=compress,format&fit=crop&blur=10&px=4)
Valencia, who came to the United States from Colombia several years ago, came to Ocampo through a free home visiting program that supports families' children's early learning and development.
This model and others like it have provided a lifeline to families, especially those who have difficulty or financial access to quality early education. The program, which is set to expand with new federal support, has proven to help children prepare for school, but has reached only a relatively small number of families.
It was while visiting a grocery store in 2022 with her two young children that someone told her about the home visiting program in Valencia. She had moved to Pueblo, Colorado just a few months ago and was feeling isolated. She has never met another person who speaks Spanish.
“I didn’t leave the house,” she said through an interpreter. “So I thought I was alone.”
The home education program for parents of preschoolers, known as HIPPY, provides families with a trained support worker (Ocampo in Valencia). This person visits your home weekly to show you how to help your child receive a fun, quality, developmental education. Appropriate activity.
The HIPPY program is unique in its two-generation approach. Through regular home visits and monthly group meetings, parents experience the program firsthand and learn how to promote early literacy and social-emotional skills from staff who often share the same language and background as the families they serve.
The programs are implemented primarily through school districts and organizations that reach low-income neighborhoods as well as immigrant and refugee families, says Miriam Westheimer, chief program officer for HIPPY International, which operates in 15 countries and 20 U.S. states.
Many other home visiting models exist, each with unique features. Some focus on maternal and child health and employ registered nurses as home visitors. Others send social workers or early childhood specialists. Services may begin as early as pregnancy or, as in the case of HIPPY, serve families with infants and preschoolers.
In the United States, 24 home visiting models have received the stamp of approval and corresponding funding from the federal government's Maternal, Infant, and Infant Home Visiting (MIECHV) program.
Dr. Michael Warren, deputy administrator for the Division of Maternal and Child Health for the Health Resources and Services Administration, which oversees the MIECHV program, says he has seen firsthand how home visiting can strengthen families, but for now, the scope is: It's too limited.
Nationwide, approximately 17 million households can benefit from Valencia's voluntary, evidence-based home visiting services. But in 2022, only about 270,000 people did so.
“It’s purely about resources,” Warren says. “If we have more resources, we can serve more families.”
Fortunately, he says, reinforcements are on the way.
Federal investment in the MIECHV program is expected to double from $400 million to $800 million annually by 2027. Starting this year, the federal government will match $3 for every dollar of non-federal funding spent on home visiting programs. sheep. Many states are expected to win easily because they already have funding mechanisms in place that combine public, nonprofit, and private donations.
Through interviews with more than 20 individuals who conduct, receive, or study home visits, and observations of two home visits in Colorado and Texas, the extent of the impact these services are having on families and communities becomes clear.
Now in her second year of the HIPPY program, Valencia has become a more confident parent. She says her structured curriculum she follows and Ocampo's support have helped prepare her daughter to thrive in kindergarten.