Champion of Children

John Bickley

JOHN E. BICKLEY NAMED – 2011 CHAMPION OF CHILDREN

Bickley will be honored at the 18th annual Champion of Children Culminating Event

John E. Bickley, President and CEO of YMCA of Central Ohio has been named the 2011 Champion of Children. Bickley joins a dedicated group of local leaders who have been recognized as Champions of Children and have made a deep, far-reaching impact on the lives of children in central Ohio.

“It is our honor to nominate John for this recognition,” said Lisa Courtice, of The Columbus Foundation and Linda Day-Mackessy, of The YMCA who nominated Bickley for the award. “John has devoted 37 years of his professional career to the mission and work of the YMCA to build strong kids, strong families and strong communities.” (read full press release as Word Doc. As PDF)

Champion Partners: AEP, Battelle, The Columbus Foundation, Nationwide, PNC.
Media Partners: Business First, Mills James Productions, Moorehead Design, Time Warner Cable, WOSU Public Media

• the importance of quality early learning
• the interconnectedness of the entire educational journey
• the impact access to learning for those most at risk has on the success of our children, our families, our schools and our communities

Champion of Children’s community conversations and partnerships will connect the dots for all children in all places by supporting and enhancing United Way of Central Ohio’s four key building blocks of a good life: quality education, stable income, good health, and safe and decent housing.

Previous Programs

Fred Andrle moderates a panel discussion with community leaders, at last year’s event, on the non-academic barriers that interfere with access to learning and the challenges this presents to the health and success of our children and our community.

Business First VIEWPOINT Column, January 28, 2011 - Connecting the dots for all children at home and school – The environment for a child matters. The advantages and disadvantages children inherit from their families, neighborhoods, early care and schooling will either support or deny them the opportunity of attaining later success. On almost every measure of well-being for which data are collected, poor children in America fare worse than more affluent kids. Often, those with difficulties in childhood see them persist in adolescence and adulthood. Read the rest of Linda Kass’ Business First column here. PDF (Copyright 2011. Business First of Columbus Inc. All rights reserved. Reprinted with permission.)

Business First VIEWPOINT Column, January 7, 2011 - Schools can’t reverse poor kids’ fortunes alone – From A Nation at Risk, the 1983 imperative for educational reform, to the recent documentary Waiting for Superman, our K-12 schools have been placed in the omnipotent position of solving our nation’s achievement gaps and, by inference, its economic woes.
Read the rest of Linda Kass’ Business First column here. PDF. (Copyright 2011. Business First of Columbus Inc. All rights reserved. Reprinted with permission.)

Business First VIEWPOINT Column, December 3, 2010 – Answers still sought on how to narrow achievement gap – More than half a century ago, Chief Justice Earl Warren observed on behalf of a unanimous Supreme Court in Brown v. Board of Education, “it is doubtful that any child may reasonably be expected to succeed in life if he is denied the opportunity of an education.”Read the rest of Linda Kass’ Business First column here. PDF. (Copyright 2010. Business First of Columbus Inc. All rights reserved. Reprinted with permission.)

Business First VIEWPOINT column, January 29, 2010 – Connecting the dots to classroom success. Today’s preschoolers, those age 3, will graduate from high school in 2025. They likely will not be ready for college unless they are ready for kindergarten in 2012. (Read the rest of Linda Kass’ Business First column here.)

Business First VIEWPOINT Column, December 4, 2009 – Time has Come to Lift our ‘Educational Mojo’- Those advocating educational reform for the past decade – a coalition of business leaders, philanthropists, mayors and school superintendents – see the low performance of U.S. school children, especially poor minorities, as a crisis that requires an overhaul of how schools are run. (Read the rest of Linda Kass’ Business First column here.)

Business First VIEWPOINT Column, September 18, 2009 – Make Early Learning Part of Education Cycle – Ohio’s officials and the early learning community share a deep commitment to early childhood education and now need to coalesce on a plan that will ensure kindergarten readiness and school success, especially for the economically disadvantaged. (Read the rest of Linda Kass’ Business First column here.)