Senior Consultant with Iowa Campaign for Grade-Level Reading and HealthConnect Fellow
(October 2019-June 2021)
Expanding the use of Sesame Street in Communities resources to help families, providers, and leaders understand how social-emotional skills contribute to the healthy development of young children in Iowa
Becky Miles-Polka’s first fellowship project focused on leveraging Medicaid to address children’s asthma by funding home assessment and housing remediation. As EveryStep took over the Healthy Homes Des Moines initiative for long-term sustainability and organizations managing Medicaid changed, working on this initiative was no longer practical.
Meanwhile, a new opportunity arose to focus on children’s social-emotional well-being when central Iowa became one of 13 communities nationwide to partner with Sesame Street in Communities. The work aligned with Miles-Polka’s role with the Iowa Campaign for Grade-Level Reading at a time when she was already thinking about how to shift systems to focus on early relational health to support young children’s healthy development.
Miles-Polka joined the Iowa Alliance for Healthy Kids’ steering committee to help lead the launch of the Sesame Street initiative and strategize its roll out. She also became an Abby’s Ambassador with Sesame Street in Communities, which allowed her to provide training to the Grade-Level Reading network, and helped distribute materials to partners to use with children and families.
The Sesame Street in Communities campaign has been tremendously successful at engaging providers and leaders across the state with trainings and a Town Hall event. The Grade-Level Reading Network has distributed books and materials and shared social media messages directed to caregivers. The work is expanding throughout the state, and Miles-Polka sees opportunities to leverage this momentum to integrate social-emotional well-being and early relational health more deeply into systems that serve families.
