“Unless someone like you cares a whole awful lot, nothing is going to get better. It’s not.” –  Dr. Seuss, The Lorax 

This is a quote hanging in Melanie Bird’s office, a Home Visitor within CAP’s Thrive to Five Head Start program. On the wall behind her, pictures of trains, cars, and airplanes line the space with buckets of toys off to the side. Melanie has been a Home Visitor for 12 years, but her journey with Head Start began long before that, 40 years ago in 1986, as a parent. 
Her son Christopher was enrolled in Head Start, and Melanie volunteered in his classroom. It was there that his teacher and classroom aide encouraged her to apply for a position. 

“And I said, ‘Yeah, what am I going to do?’ And they said, ‘We need you to drive the bus. We need a bus driver.’ I said, ‘I am not driving that bus.’ So needless to say, I got my bus license. They paid for it. And I drove bus for 24 years, picking the kids up, working in the classroom, taking them home, then coming back to clean. Forty hours a week.” 

She spent those years split between being a bus driver and classroom aide. Then, 15 years ago, when the bus program ended, Melanie switched gears to teaching. She earned her Child Development Associate credential and stepped into a new role as a Home Visitor, bringing Head Start’s mission directly into the families she serves.  

Now, Melanie describes her home visiting work in seasons and each one has its own rhythm. Some bring families with similar needs: employment support, parenting guidance, safety resources. Others are more varied. This season, she carries a caseload of 12 children, driving across Lancaster County four days a week to sit for an hour and a half with each child and their family. 

“I become part of the furniture,” she says. “Like their grandma. I am in their house weekly.” 

That closeness is intentional. For Melanie, while her work is centered on the child, she also strives to support the whole family.  She walks them through parent advice, strategies, and ways to support the child and their family. 

“My job is this child…so its whatever’s best for them,” says Melanie. But she also recognizes that the family is key to this. “You have to make the family whole, because a kid isn’t going to learn if parents are arguing, if the environment is unstable, or if they’re hungry.” 

Walking the Journey 
Across 39 years of working with parents, single moms, single dads, grandparents, and children of varying abilities, Melanie’s approach to being a Home Visitor is shaped by four things. 

Leave bias at the door. “I check my biases at the door. I don’t make assumptions or judgments. I go in there and I genuinely just listen, and I walk the journey with the family.” 

Listen. Melanie doesn’t arrive with an agenda. She shows up in a t-shirt, brings toys, and sits with families the way a grandmother would, present and with the children and their family. She makes sure to listen to what the child and family want, hearing what a family is saying, what they’re seeing, what they need, what they’re ready for. 

Build the relationship first. Melanie believes that trust isn’t assumed but earned, visit by visit. This is evident whenever six of Melanie’s parents  stepped up to serve on a volunteer parent committee. When  a colleague asked how she did it, to her, the answer was simple: she asked them, and they came, because the relationship was already there. It took time, listening, and leaving bias to build a relationship week by week.  

Always follow through. “You also have to follow through. If I promise anything, by high water, I get it done.” That might mean bringing paint because a child asked for it or following through on a resource for a parent. It means never making a promise she can’t keep.
 
What It’s All For