Improving Education: Expansion and Growth
On September 22nd, 2022, Improving Education hosted a ribbon-cutting ceremony for their new warehouse. In the week following this ceremony, I had the privilege of sitting down with Jarrod Bolte, the Founder, and CEO of Improving Education, as well as Garima Bhatt Handley, the Executive Director. We discussed Improving Education’s mission, its evolving leadership model, and the role Impact Hub Baltimore has played in Improving Education’s journey.
On Thursday, September 22nd, I attended a ribbon-cutting ceremony for Improving Education’s new warehouse in East Baltimore. Improving Education’s new space consists of a large white warehouse gleaming with balloons that welcomed attendees to the event. When I entered, the joy that radiated from the Improving Education team was palpable and contagious. Team members moved throughout the space, welcoming each person and encouraging them to look around and embrace the opportunity to network with other attendees. Infographics about Improving Education, the warehouse, and its supporters were placed strategically throughout the space. Before the ribbon-cutting ceremony, multiple supporters, team members, and community members offered compelling thoughts about the growth of Improving Education and its journey into this new space. Later, team members led tour groups throughout the impressive new warehouse.
Improving Education was founded in 2015 to help improve early literacy for all children. Improving Education focuses on birth through grade 3 to improve literacy in schools, through educators, and at home. One of the biggest initiatives that Improving Education has begun for at-home learning, is the innovative “Bedtime in a Box”. Bedtime in a Box provides the tools for parents to create a healthy and educational bedtime routine. Each box is composed of required toiletries, bath necessities, five age-appropriate books, a routine log, pajamas, a stuffed animal, an alarm clock, and a Teach My Learning Kit.
Separately, following the 2020 Covid-19 school shutdown, Improving Education began “Learning in a Box”, an initiative intended to maximize the impact of virtual learning by supplying different required learning materials at students’ grade levels. Jarrod Bolte describes the importance of getting into homes with these programs, stating “parents and caregivers have access to those materials, supplies, and knowledge at a much earlier age and in a much more streamlined way than they would have had before.”
All of Improving Education’s programming falls behind one essential mission: to offer children a better education. Bolte argues that many of the struggles and challenges that Baltimore City currently faces can be tied to failures in the education system. When asked about how Improving Education fits into Baltimore, Bolte states that Baltimore is “really unique in that way. It also gives us the opportunity to really…make changes and then scale that within those existing structures much more rapidly than some other places.”
Bolte’s thoughts about how Improving Education will continue to have a direct impact on Baltimore children’s future are further articulated by Bhatt Handley: “[i]f we are able to provide these opportunities, we’re able to increase the percentage of children that are demonstrating readiness for kindergarten. And so children are then entering school and have the ability to read proficiently, … that is going to ultimately affect their ability to graduate from high school, matriculate to college and reach all of their professional and personal goals,” Handley describes how the amount of brain development between the ages of zero to five, makes even more integral the fact that “we are providing resources and educational opportunities that really target that specific time in a child’s life.”
Improving Education was one of the first members of Impact Hub Baltimore. Bolte describes how when IHB opened, Improving Education had one of the first office spaces. He chose IHB because it was close to the Central Office in Baltimore City schools and embedded within the innovation side of work within the city. At IHB he connected with many other innovators and entrepreneurs in the community. Bolte describes how: “we had a space that we could bring people into….I could make deeper connections with people I didn’t know. It was Impact Hub who gave us the space to be able to innovate and to launch this program.” It was at IHB that Improving Education launched Bedtime in a Box, and Bolte credits IHB with being a big part of the success of Improving Education. Improving Education has grown significantly from this point. “In our first year, I think we were a $28,000 organization. And next year we will be a $2.8million model”, states Bolte. When asked about IHB’s overall contribution to Improving Education, Bolte says, “ I don’t think we would have been where we are now if we had not gone to Impact Hub.”
As Improving Education has expanded into a larger business, its leadership model has expanded to facilitate this increase in programming. “I think to what’s exciting about how our leadership has evolved with our growth is you know the first year 2016, Jarrod distributed 75 boxes to families in South Baltimore and … we’ve grown exponentially, and since then we’ve distributed over 23,000 boxes and so it has required more staff at every level”, states Bhatt Handley. Bolte describes how Improving Education wanted to expand into different areas in different states, so they made it a point to “manage networks of schools” to scale their Bedtime in a Box program, as well as do some deeper work with Baltimore City Schools or even some national initiatives. Their leadership model revolves around hiring people right out of the public school system, as they have found great success working with “folks who were teaching in schools, who were incredibly effective early childhood education teachers.” As the work has evolved and grown, new levels of oversight have been required, which has ultimately allowed Improving Education to expand its mission even further. However, the guiding principle remains the same for each community into which they expand. Improving Education bases changes and modifications to each program “within the context of their community because they know what needs to be done.” This extends from one essential founding principle: “the people who are closest to the problem have the most knowledge to solve it.”
Connect with Improving Education today! Further information and resources about Improving Education and Impact Hub Baltimore are featured below.
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Impact Hub Newsletter — Subscribe now!
Impact Hub Baltimore — Connect with our website!
@impacthub_baltimore- Follow us on Instagram!
