40 Under 40 Awards Steering Committee
c/o Stars
200 Middle Street
Weymouth, MA 02189
Home
About Stars:
Our role in the community:
With more than forty years of experience, Stars (formerly South Shore Day Care Services) is one of the state’s most respected early education and youth development community-based organizations. Throughout the year over 1200 children, ages 2 months to 16 years, attend our family child care system, Early Head Start program, 3 preschool centers, 4 school age centers, middle school program, 2 high school programs and summer camp. We are committed to serving a diverse population, with an emphasis on supporting low-income parents and at-risk children.
Four core goals form the foundation of our work. They are to:
- Enable parents to work
- Help each child reach their full developmental potential
- Facilitate positive youth development
- Improve academic achievement for students at risk of academic failure
Our 3 nationally accredited preschool centers are located in Quincy, Randolph and Weymouth. Our 31 family child care providers are located in Braintree, Holbrook, Quincy, Randolph, Weymouth and Whitman. Our school age programs are located in Quincy, Randolph and Weymouth. Our 8 week summer day camp is located at Hale Reservation in Westwood. We provide year round care and support for working families including information, referral, and advocacy, as well as emergency assistance for basic needs.
Programs and Services:
In addition to providing early care and education, and youth development programs listed above, we have a research based family literacy program called RISE (Reading Is So Exciting). Since 2001, SSDCS/Stars has also administered the UWMBMV Family Stability Fund for the communities of Weymouth and Randolph.
Our core expertise is our ability to integrate values and goals into program specific activities. We are especially skilled at:
- Supporting families
- Early assessment and intervention
- Individual planning for children with social/emotional issues
- Developmentally appropriate early education
- Academic enrichment
- Relationship building
- Measuring outcomes
- Professional development
Who benefits from our services?
Annually over 1,200 children benefit from services. Over sixty percent of our children are from racial and ethnic minority families, which is a much higher percentage than the South Shore's overall population. As a result of our experience and flexibility, we serve many of the area's most challenging children – those who have not been successful in another program or whom the Department of Children & Families, public schools and other referral sources believe will not be successful elsewhere.
Children attending our programs in FY'10:
89% have low income families
25% have identified social/emotional concerns
23% of their families have been involved with Dept. of Children and Families
46% live in single parent households
17% have parents with substance abuse or mental health concerns
14% were in foster care or living with relatives other than parents.
Our vibrant volunteer program:
In FY ’10, 365 community and corporate volunteers contributed over 6,000 hours of service to our programs, facilities, events, and administrative tasks.
