ShoreUp Pivots to Program Focused on Younger Children

SALISBURY, MD- Shore Up is making changes to its Head Start and early head start programs after receiving a new grant from the state.

The Head Start program will go from 761 children to 170 and Early Head Start will increase from 172 children to 402.

They say some in their head start program were old enough that they qualified for services from public schools.

that forced ShoreUp to compete with public schools and having resources overlap while younger kids received fewer services.

Shore Up says their goal was to help as many as possible which they believe they can by shifting to younger children.

They say services like early education, and day-care can be extremely expensive or in some cases not exist at all.

“This opportunity opens up access more for the lower age group there are not a lot of daycare providers affordable child care in the state of Maryland in our service area with childcare subsidies,” said ShoreUp Director Dr. Corey Bowen.

Bowen told 47ABC an added benefit of the shift is the length of time that they can offer their services.

The head start program was only able to run for 9 months while with an early head start, those kids can get care year-round care from ShoreUp.