Smart Start, heralded as the premiere early childhood program in the country, was established in 1993 in North Carolina as a comprehensive, community-based initiative designed to assure that every child received the developmental opportunities they need to begin school healthy and ready to succeed. At the local level, there are seventy-nine nonprofit organizations (encompassing all one hundred counties) with responsibility for Smart Start and the development and implementation of comprehensive school readiness initiatives. These organizations are known as Local Partnerships. The Cleveland County Partnership for Children is the Local Partnership administering Smart Start in Cleveland County. Smart Start funds are allocated annually by the North Carolina Partnership for Children to support local school readiness system building efforts. The Cleveland County Partnership for Children’s annual allocation is based on the number of children in our county aged birth to five, their specific needs, and the amount of funds available from other sources. To map out our local school readiness system building efforts, the Cleveland County Partnership for Children has united community leaders, child care providers, parents, teachers, human service providers, religious leaders and the business community.

The CCPFC is governed by a twenty-one member board of directors made up of local citizens ensuring that local communities have the responsibility for making decisions on how best to serve their children using Smart Start funding. In addition, each year over 200 volunteers donate thousands of hours on behalf of the Cleveland County Partnership for Children to ensure the needs of our youngest citizens are met. Local organizations and businesses such as the Cleveland County Schools, Chamber of Commerce, Kiwanis Club, the Dover Foundation, Bridgestone/Firestone, Wal-Mart and others have endorsed the work of Smart Start. Large corporations/foundations such as Blue Cross/Blue Shield, Food Lion, Wachovia, Glaxo/Welcome, AT&T, Kellogg Foundation, Golden Coral, and Duke Energy have contributed millions of dollars to Smart Start at the state level. These funds are then distributed to local partnerships.