Rural Early Year's Coalition (REYC)

...an Action and Advisory Committee to the Saskatoon RIC

REYC is a working group of partners striving to improve the lives of families and children in the rural Saskatoon Health Region.

Principles:
~to understand the assets and opportunities for children aged 0-6 years and their families who live in rural Saskatoon Health Region.
to honour the context of children’s lives; understanding the influence of families and communities in their health and wellbeing.
~to work holistically.
~to recognize that the committee’s focus may change over time, based on an ongoing analysis of rural communities’ assets and opportunities.

Purpose:
Using an Asset-Based approach, the Rural Early Years Coalition will:

• collect and share information with various partners about assets and opportunities for children 0-6 years and their families who live in rural Saskatoon Health Region;
• Establish ad hoc committee(s) on rural targeted issues as identified.
• work collaboratively and support partners in the creation and implementation of service delivery programs for the target group;
• advise RIC and KidsFirst on rural issues;
• act as an advisory committee to the Saskatoon Regional Intersectoral Committee for rural issues for children for children 0-6 years;
  
  What we do:
• Accountable to the RIC and KidsFirst Saskatoon;
• support the strategic objectives of the RIC, but in a rural context
• facilitate establishment of Advisory Committee meetings on a semi-annual basis;
• facilitate the development of functional partnerships with REYC;
• identify methods to collect information (i.e. asset mapping);
• cause the creation, recruitment for, and implementation of ad hoc committees as required;
• present information to RIC and provide updates on initiatives and emerging policy issues affecting children aged 0-6 years and their families who live in rural Saskatoon Health Region;
• link REYC with urban coalitions (i.e. C4C Early Years Coalition)
• provide advise to other groups and organizations (i.e. Parent Mentoring Program);
• ensure that experiences inform research and research informs best practices;
• actively seek funding for projects and support funding applications, as necessary
• create and submit a yearly work plan and monitoring report that would examine the work of the Rural Early Years Coalition in accomplishing the strategic objectives in a rural context.
• creating annual or semi-annual communication or policy papers for RIC on issues that affect children ages 0-6 years and their families who live in rural Saskatchewan
• communicate to the participants of Advisory Committee;
• respective representatives are responsible to communicate with their organizations;
  individuals are accountable to identify their organizational mandates, and look for common interests that will foster collaborative projects that build assets and opportunities for children aged 0-6 years and their families who live in rural Saskatchewan Health Region.