In Our Voices, Our Future, members of the NC Child Youth Advocacy Council (YAC) will share their stories and experiences around the youth mental health crisis—and share with us their vision for a healthier future for themselves and their peers. 

In Room to Grow, policy and child development experts and leaders in North Carolina’s business community will discuss what works in current ECE policy what steps we can take to make North Carolina the best place to raise a family.

In The Future of Foster Care, panelists will highlight some of the current challenges within the foster care system and some of the innovative strategies community-serving organizations and DSS offices are deploying to improve outcomes for some of our state’s most vulnerable children.

Keeping Company will focus on outlining North Carolina’s youth and parent loneliness epidemic and share key findings from Harvard University’s Making Caring Common project. Keeping Company is a generative session facilitated by Joe Waters, co-founder and CEO at Capita.

In Building Blocks, our panelists will discuss how different public policies and strategic investments can help North Carolina’s child care centers recruit and retain the desperately needed “workforce behind the workforce.”

In Healthy Minds, Healthy Futures, our panelists will discuss innovative funding models and delivery systems, public policies, and other school-based interventions that can lead to more positive mental health outcomes for North Carolina youth.

In Feeding Families, our panelists will address the drivers of food insecurity across the state, its impacts on child health and development, and how sound public policies can change the outlook for North Carolina’s children and families.