Clarence Day Was a Remarkable Partner to ECI

OCT. 29, 2009 │The Mississippi State University (MSU) Early Childhood Institute lost a great friend October 24 when Clarence Day of Memphis died.

“Mr. Day was one of the earliest and most steadfast supporters of the Early Childhood Institute. Innumerable young children in Mississippi have received stronger early educations thanks to his contributions to professional development and quality improvements in early care and education,” Cathy Grace, Ed.D., said this week.

The Day Foundation, Day’s philanthropic arm, contributed more than $2 million to the institute (ECI) during its first decade of operation. (See details of the foundation’s giving history here.)

The Day Foundation helped ECI design and launch several major programs:

*Leaders in Literacy
*The Early Literacy Corps
*Right from Birth
*The Early Learning Mentoring Program
*The Child Development Associate Scholarship Program
*The National Center for Rural Early Childhood Learning Initiatives
*The Rebuilding After Katrina Initiative

However, the foundation’s unrestricted awards to support operation of the institute were its most significant investment. This support enabled ECI to obtain significant matching funds and to recruit and retain key professional staff members, of whom some have remained with the institute through its first nine years. Thanks to the continuity of operations and the capacity for long-range planning made possible by the Day Foundation, ECI has been able to:

• Significantly strengthen its research capacity–

*Earning high ratings in administration of the most sensitive and sophisticated measures of early childhood program quality in existence

*Pioneering spatial analysis of early childhood services in the United States

*Achieving ground-breaking improvements in key early literacy skills for young children through the Early Learning Mentoring Program

• Expand its services –

*From serving approximately 150 early care and education sites in the Partners for Quality Child Care program in 2001 to 454 sites in more than a dozen programs in 2008

• Refine its strategic objectives –

*Leading the design and implementation of the Mississippi Child Care Quality Step System

and

• Earning another $45 million (through 2009) from additional funding organizations

“Clarence Day had a great heart and a generous hand,” Grace said. “We will miss him deeply.”

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