Head Start has new director - NewsRegister.com - News and ...

Marcus Larson / News-Register
Suey Linzmeier has replaced Michael Eichman as Head Start director.

Sep 29, 2012

By Starla Pointer
Of the News-Register

Suey Linzmeier has been named executive director of Head Start of Yamhill County. She replaces Michael Eichman, who is retiring after 17 years in the post.

Linzmeier previously served as assistant director and coordinator of the Early Head Start program with the nonprofit, which operates centers in McMinnville, Dayton, Sheridan and Newberg. Before that, she served as a family educator and teacher at the Sheridan center.

Head Start is a federal- and state-funded program that promotes school readiness for children from low-income families. It is currently serving 415 children, pre-natal through age 4, in Yamhill County.

Its programs aim to enhance children?s social, cognitive and emotional development through services involving their health, nutrition, socialization and education. Staff members work closely with families as well as youngsters, focusing on parents as children?s first and most important teachers.

Linzmeier said the best part about Head Start is that it?s not a program just for children. It serves entire families.

?It?s a human development organization,? she said.

She said Head Start staff members work with parents to teach them the skills they need to improve themselves, as well as to become better parents.

Every family has to set goals. As a result, she said, last year 22 Head Start parents earned their GEDs, while others regained custody of children, made down payments on homes or started college.

?We?re the ones who believe in them,? she said. ?A lot of our families didn?t have good situations when they were growing up, and they need to learn how to be really strong parents. We help to teach them.?

Many Head Start parents go on to get good jobs, she said, and some find jobs with Head Start itself. In fact, she said, 30 percent of the local staff members started as parents in the program.

Linzmeier moved to Yamhill County in 2007 from Juneau, Alaska. She had worked in early childhood education during her 25 years there, serving as program manager for the Association for the Education of Young Children Southeast?s child care food program, adjunct professor at the University of Fairbanks and chapter founder of the Alaska Child Care Food Program Sponsor Network and Alaska Family Child Care Association Southeast.

She holds a degree in child development and family studies from the University of Alaska-Fairbanks and a graduate certificate in infant toddler mental health from Portland State University.

As part of her work with Head Start of Yamhill County, Linzmeier has served as liaison to the Yamhill County Commission on Children and Family?s Early Childhood Coordinating Council. The council, a collaborative effort of several agencies, aims to ensure that all young children and their families have access to quality resources that support growth and development.

She also has helped Head Start win a federal grant to expand its services to 48 expectant families, as well as infants and toddlers.

Eichman, the former director, is still involved with Head Start on a contractual basis, as the agency considers development of additional facilities.

He said he is pleased with the choice of Linzmeier as his successor.

?She has been with the program long enough to have achieved measurable success with both Early Head Start and our Head Start program,? he said. ?Her leadership skills are impressive. She is clearly the right person at the right time in the right place.?

For more information, call the office at 472-2000 or visit www.yamhillheadstart.org.

Source: http://www.newsregister.com/article?articleTitle=head-start-has-new-director--1348930078--4787--

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