One City, One Child at a Time

With the start of the Spring semester, students in Edgewood College’s ‘Pre-reading and Literature for the Young Child’ practicum are completing part of their requirements on-site at Madison’s One City preschool. One City is a nonprofit preschool located in South Madison. 

Our students work with One City teachers to identify reading materials for young children from diverse backgrounds, and engage One City’s children in the classroom in pre-reading and literacy development activities.

One of those students is Michelle Vasquez. Ms. Vasquez, an Education major who is also a veteran of the U.S. Army, says One City’s approach of serving the whole person (even a very young person) is critical to their future.

“We learn at Edgewood College that you can ‘feed’ a child all the education you want but if their home life is not good then that education will not go as far as you want it to,” she says. “A child cannot succeed unless they have the family life to help support the learning taking place.”    

Dr. Cynthia Perry (that's Dr. Perry above, on the left) oversees the Early Childhood Program at Edgewood College and is the lead instructor for this initiative.

“This partnership with One City is a commitment both to our students at Edgewood College, and to the very young in our community,” she says. “The impact our students have on the communities we serve, and on the quality of the teaching and learning the College provides is significant. This partnership advances both in a very real way.”

The relationship with One City may go far, Ms. Vasquez adds. She’s in the planning stages of opening a second location of the preschool program after graduation. But even if that doesn’t become reality, she says, the experience of working directly with the young students, and working closely with the professionals at One City, is invaluable.
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