Our Key Ingredients For Successful Collaboration

KConnect focuses on four distinct areas of our work. These areas are:

Equity Approach

We believe that equity must be the driving factor in our process, policies, and among our network partners.

Data and Impact

We are continuously tracking and disaggregating data to create system-level change.

Process and Facilitation

KConnect acts as a neutral facilitator for our Workgroups.

Workgroups

KConnect workgroups are broken up into three distinct categories to better focus our strategies.

Equity Approach

We believe that equity must be the driving factor in our systems in our community. We define success by achieving equitable outcomes for children and families  – which means that there is no disparity in outcomes based on race/ethnicity in Kent County. We include and compensate the voices of those most impacted by racist and inequitable policies and procedures in our design process. (For more information on how we engage the community, please review our Community Engagement Spectrum.) Our strategies acknowledge that structural racism is foundational in our systems and our work is to dismantle it. To support the workgroups, we have a Equity and Inclusion Workgroup and Equity Advisors that attend every workgroup meeting in order to keep equity at the forefront of the work.

Data and Impact

KConnect is data informed, meaning we track and disaggregate local metrics on our 8 Success Measures and 27 Indicators in order to determine how to optimize strategies that create the most equitable outcomes for our community. We share this data publicly on our Data Dashboard.

Without continuously tracking and disaggregating data, it is unlikely that our community will achieve system-level change. We use data to track progress and disaggregate it in order to get a complete picture of the inequities in our system. Without data, we won’t have a collective understanding of the problems facing our community nor will we have the tools to address them. As our network continues to evolve, this data will affect policy changes and system-level strategies that address the areas that need the most attention.

Process and Facilitation

KConnect acts as a neutral facilitator for our Workgroups. In collaboration with external consultants and Workgroup leadership, we develop processes and frameworks that can be utilized by each team to achieve their goals. We also partner with professional facilitators to act as part of the Workgroup leadership teams.

Our Workgroups

KConnect workgroups are broken into three distinct categories: Core Workgroups, Cross-Cutting Workgroups, and a Foundational Workgroup. For more information on our Workgroups, please visit our Workgroups Overview page.