A robust body of evidence over the past half a century has documented the importance of early childhood experiences for adult outcomes. From maternal prenatal care to early intervention in infancy and toddlerhood, and through high-quality care and educational experiences in the preschool years, support services and programs for families and young children have been shown to improve children’s outcomes into the school years and adulthood.

Building on this promising evidence base, the Ready for School, Ready for Life initiative in Guilford County, North Carolina, aims to support interconnected programs and services for young children and their families with the goal of having children enter kindergarten ready for learning. The initiative aims to strengthen connections among existing programs in Guilford County and provide sustainable and comprehensive support for families and young children through universal screening for strengths and needs, followed with connections to targeted services. Launched in 2018, the initiative has eight components focusing on families and children prenatally through age 3, clustered in three areas: building a system of care, expanding and improving services, and changing systems and building public will.

This report provides an overview of the early phases of the initiative, and of MDRC’s evaluation of it—the Guilford Readiness of Children for School (ROCS) study—which includes an implementation substudy and an outcomes-monitoring substudy. It also summarizes MDRC’s analyses regarding the feasibility of evaluating the impacts of the initiative and conducting cost-benefit analyses of it.

The ROCS implementation substudy seeks to evaluate how the Ready Ready initiative is being implemented, to what extent its stated values are evident in the initiative as implemented, and the types of services and activities families with young children participate in, among other research questions. The ROCS outcomes-monitoring substudy will attempt to document the extent to which the well-being of children and families in Guilford County—and disparities in well-being—are changing over time. Publications from this evaluation are planned each year through 2031.