Trust for Learning invests in our mission to expand ideal learning environments for every young child through five strategies: movement building, Head Start, policy, networks of practice, and educator development. Serving as Chief Learning & Evaluation Officer, Toscha builds on a dynamic portfolio of projects to develop new philanthropic partnerships in all of these areas, with a particular focus on expanding and sharing learnings from our efforts in Head Start.

Grantee/Director of a $5MM federally-funded Early Head Start Program. Responsible for the design of the program’s internal structures, systems and policies. Reviews and monitors achievement of program goals and deliverables while encouraging continuous quality improvement. Ensures coordination among service content areas, across levels and within the organization. Provides leadership to a team of 55 staff across three communities in South Philadelphia, Norristown and Pottstown (Montgomery County, PA).

Provides leadership and overall administration of the Early Head Start program in Montgomery and Bucks County (PA); including program development and implementation, monitoring and supervision of home-based services and coordination of EHS center-based child care partnerships.Director of two locations in Norristown and Pottstown with 27 team members including six content area coordinators/managers. Ensures that program operations are in compliance with Federal Head Start Performance Standards and local, state and agency policies and procedures. Supports and promotes a consistent exchange of information with internal and external stakeholders of the program. Participates in the design of the program’s internal structures, systems and policies. Reviews and monitors achievement of program goals and deliverables while encouraging continuous quality improvement. Ensures coordination among service content areas, across levels and within the organization. Provides oversight of data tracking for Montgomery/Bucks counties. Directly supervises the Family & Community Engagement, Child Development & Disabilities, and Health & Safety Coordinators.

The Montgomery County Office of Public Health (OPH) and the Montgomery County Maternal and Early Childhood Consortium (MECC) undertook a process to directly address the racial disparities in birth outcomes in Montgomery County. Following the Perinatal Periods of Risk methodology, they developed a set of 12 recommendations falling into five overarching strategies which are presented in in the PPOR Report: Understanding and Addressing Racial Inequities in Birth Outcomes in Montgomery County February 2020. Ms. Blalock has served on the MECC steering committee since 2015 and is the project lead for Montco Mamas.

Serving as faculty for AAP's Project ECHO with a focus on improving maternal and infant health for families affected by prenatal opioid exposure. Project ECHO is an innovative hub and spoke program, designed to create knowledge networks by connecting health care providers with an expert team through a tele-mentoring program using brief lectures and case‐based presentations. These networks have been shown to increase capacity for health care providers to identify, treat, and manage patient care. Using basic, widely available teleconferencing technology, clinical management tools, and case‐based learning, health care providers develop knowledge and self‐efficacy on techniques for management of care and quality improvement.

Project manager/researcher guiding research activities, providing team structure and contributing to the qualitative and quantitative data collection and analysis for several ongoing research projects including a rigorous mixed-method experimental study of the i3 scale-up of the Reading Recovery program and a study of the Pennsylvania Keystone STARS quality rating and improvement system (QRIS). The Consortium for Policy Research in Education brings together education experts from renowned research institutions to contribute new knowledge that informs K-12 education policy and practice.

Program Quality Assessment (formerly Environment Rating Scales) Supervisor in the Southeast Region (Philadelphia, Delaware, and Montgomery Counties) for Pennsylvania’s child care quality improvement initiatives, Keystone STARS, PA PreK Counts, and others. This position involved the following activities: •Supervising a team of assessors that travel throughout the state to determine if individual sites have attained the quality standards;•Training child care providers to conduct quality assessments of the early learning environment which prepares them to successfully improve their programs; •Maintaining quality and group integrity by participating in regular professional development activities;•Reviewing and editing detailed reports summarizing the results of observations using a standardized tool and;•Coordinating efforts with other agencies within Keystone STARS and other PA Quality Improvement Initiatives to present a cohesive system for the program participants.

Directed a state-funded initiative, the Montgomery County Child Care Consortium, which culminated in the creation of a comprehensive plan to improve the availability, accessibility and quality of child care in Montgomery County, PA. This project involved:•Forming and leading a steering committee of community leaders;•Interviewing stakeholders, developing and distributing a parent survey, and maintaining a website for informational and data collection purposes;•Seeking financial and other resources to expand the project;•Following the development of the strategic plan, duties shifted to implementation of the recommendations and;•Subsequently, responsibilities were expanded to include quality improvement efforts on behalf of MELC’s child care sites utilizing the NAEYC and NSACA accreditation processes and the Head Start and Early Head Start performance standards.

Carried out all evaluation activities including the organization of data collection, interviewing key informants, conducting focus groups, performing observations, inputting and analyzing data, and reporting the findings with a team of researchers who lead the field in child development issues.

Implemented the process evaluations for several federally funded research projects aimed at preventing substance abuse among high-risk youth, supporting grandparents and relative caregivers, and assessing barriers to school performance.

Simultaneously participated in the evaluation design, data collection, and analysis of two projects: a rites-of-passage and mentoring program for inner-city middle school girls and a research project for formerly homeless women recovering from substance abuse problems.