Avance in Santa Barbara
In the Santa Barbara Independent, the story of how Whatever It Takes helped bring AVANCE, a great program for parents, to town:
AVANCE is an early childhood and parenting program aimed at lower-income Hispanic communities that began in San Antonio, Texas. …
The principal of McKinley [Elementary School], Emilio Handall (who will become an assistant superintendent in July), first read about AVANCE inWhatever It Takes, a book about educational reformer Geoffrey Canada’s Harlem Children’s Zone. Handall raised the idea with Jon Clark, executive director of the James S. Bower Foundation, and before he knew it, the Santa Barbara school district had obtained grant money to send a contingency down to San Antonio to learn about the program.