NORTHAMPTON — Five years into a project to expand access to early education, Northampton has become a prime mover in building partnerships among various providers in the field.

“What’s happening in Northampton is reshaping the system so that it works better for children and families,” said Laura Frogameni, preschool and partnership coordinator at Northampton school district’s Early Childhood Center.

The aim of the Commonwealth Preschool Partnership Initiative (CPPI) is to establish a districtwide preschool program across public and community-based early education classes and care programs, according to the Department of Early Education and Care.

Northampton has received $670,000 annually since 2019 to build toward the state’s goal of a mixed delivery system, under which the public schools work together with family child care providers and center-based programs.

“It’s shared professional development,” Frogrameni said. “We’re all getting better at what we do, spending time together.”

Part of improving access to preschool is giving parents of children with disabilities more choice over where to send their child.

Previously, children with disabilities or developmental delays would have to go to public preschool to get services. While public schools still provide services, the partnership grant pays for special educators to travel to early education and child care centers, bringing their services to where the children are.

“Most parents are working or going to school full time, and the public preschool schedule (half a day during the school year) doesn’t work for them,” said Gwen Hawk, education director for Head Start and Early Learning Programs.

“Parents needed to choose between a full day of care or getting services,” she said. “With this grant they don’t have to choose.”

Similarly, if a child qualified for services because of a speech delay, parents previously would have to find a speech/language pathologist and bring their child there and back, said Suzanne Stillinger, director and accessibility coordinator for New Village, a year-round preschool in Northampton.

Frequently, logistical problems would mean the child would not get the necessary support.

The partnership grant “has made sure there are itinerant services for families,” Stillinger said.

Additionally, in the field of early education, there’s a wide range of individual providers running their own programs in their own silos.

“It can be very isolating,” Stillinger said. “We don’t have teachers lounge, there aren’t a lot of opportunities to do community-building.”

Now, teachers in the different schools and child care centers have access to connections and support services that weren’t there before.

“It’s made a huge difference in the amount of support that we feel,” she said. “Before, everyone was inventing their own wheel.”

Head Start teachers have had the opportunity for trainings with the public schools and vice versa, Hawk said.

“Some of the shared professional development has helped us speak each other’s languages,” she said.

The grant also provides some money to community-based preschools and child care centers to allow them to offset costs for parents. The public preschools already charge fees on a sliding scale.

Other things supported by the grant funds include supplies, adaptive materials and a staff person or classroom teacher at individual sites, such as Head Start and New Village. It pays teachers to advance their certifications and supports family child care with subsidies.

The goal, Frogameni said, is not only to get all children ready for kindergarten, but for preschool-age children to have access to quality education wherever they go to school.

“From a disability perspective, what I prioritize is making sure kindergarten classes are ready for every kid, when they can self-regulate,” Stillinger said. “It’s learning readiness.”

Northampton secured a grant through the Preschool Partnership Initiative in 2019, and has become one of the leaders statewide.

“We were one of the founding members,” Frogameni said. “We’ve done presentations in other school districts on building partnerships. We’ve been instrumental in building out the model.”

The administration is making an additional $5 million available, with applications due Feb. 15. Designated “gateway cities” such as Holyoke — midsize urban centers that anchor regional economies around the state while facing economic challenges — will have priority in those grant awards, Frogameni said.

She said she sees the Healey administration “doubling down” on the initiative. If the grant funding were to go away, she said, the program would be at risk.

“If we can get more cities on board, it’s no longer a pilot program — it’s the way we do business,” Frogameni said.