Standing, Mary-Ann Vickers Mans , Paula holds her two sons

As a mother of two beautiful boys in North City, St. Louis, I wake up each morning to advocate for my babies. It goes beyond the two born during a global pandemic – I fight for the thousands of babies in St. Louis lacking adequate childcare, including the under-resourced facilities and teachers crucial for women like me to succeed as working mothers.

I didn’t always have this passion and motivation I now have as a community advocate for early childhood education. In fact, I grew up in a very sheltered and protected environment. As a child, I wasn’t exposed to the same realities most of the kids in my North City neighborhood grew up with. Although I've always loved working with children, even at a young age, I never knew the struggle that many kids in St. Louis City experienced until I became a social worker. While working as a social worker, I quickly came to realize the true struggle many kids in our community face every day.  

So, how did I become so passionate about early childhood education? It started in 2020 when I gave birth to my first child, a baby boy. When I got pregnant, everyone was telling me I needed to get my baby on a childcare waitlist as soon as possible.

As a first-time mom, exploring childcare spaces was a lot to take in. There were so many different options, and you could easily tell if resources were either there or not.

Financially I needed to go back to work, so I started putting baby Vickers on these waitlists at different facilities. As the months went by, anxiety started to build, and it made it even tougher that I was going through the experience without my mom or grandmother to help me.

When I gave birth to my first son, the COVID pandemic had just begun, and childcare still wasn’t available. When it was time for me to return to work, my family stepped up to support us, which brought a lot of stress on them as well as myself. I would work from home when I could and often worked very early in the morning or late at night to get my work done. When I had my second baby boy, something unexpected happened. I experienced postpartum depression for the first time. It was a very different experience because I felt very accomplished and proud of everything that I did with the first baby. With the second baby, I felt I was not doing anything right. Although I planned to take a career break and become a stay-at-home mom since I still couldn’t find childcare, I decided I couldn’t mentally afford to leave my career. I wanted to work and stay in my career. At work, I felt good about myself–I received a promotion and was showered with accolades. Then, I would come home and just feel like a failure. I couldn’t leave this space of working hard, being rewarded and having people acknowledge you're doing a good job. This decision to return to work put even more stress on my family, to the point that my family fell apart.

Reaching a breaking point, I said enough was enough and began looking for a solution. I could no longer stay in that space where I felt I was a success at work but a failure at home. So, I searched for parent meetings and went to all the meetups. Being the only Black mom at the meetups and “parent and me” classes was a weird dynamic for me. So, I continued looking for alternative spaces.

Paula at the Community Check In

Then, I saw a friend's post about WEPOWER Weekend and the Garden Party. I felt this was an answered prayer because the post was calling for folks to “pull up for our babies”! I grew up surrounded by a village of mothers, grandmothers, and aunties who just loved protecting children and giving children opportunities. I didn’t feel like that type of village mentality existed anymore, and it was something I longed for. So, of course, I got dressed up, which I hadn’t done in a while as a mom of two – and went to see what this was all about. The Garden Party was amazing and so much fun. During the event, Charli Cooksey (Founder of WEPOWER) gave a speech and talked about how we have to do better by our babies. So, after the event, I started exploring how I could get involved. 

After attending my first Power and Policy Action Group (PPAG) meeting, I got a call from one of the OGs, Buena Vista. She shared with me an opportunity to attend another meeting in which they were providing childcare, so I had no excuse not to go. When I showed up at the next meeting, I found out we were going to be testifying for a campaign demanding St. Louis County fund early childhood education.

I ended up testifying that night, and although it was cracking, I knew how important my voice was –how important it was to share my story in solidarity with other parents, educators and early childhood practitioners.

After that night, I kept attending WEPOWER events and even started inviting my friends and family. At the beginning of 2023, I joined the WEPOWER team full-time, where I became a catalyst for change–blending my expertise, experience, and passion. I also applied to the Chisholm's Chair program. It was the most impactful experience of my life, opening a gateway for me to actively advocate for meaningful change in my community. Through this cohort, I found and built relationships with other women who are invested in this work as well.

After a long, exhausting wait, I am now fortunate my children are in an early childhood development space, and it is magic. Having my sons enrolled in a quality education space has healed me in ways that I could not have imagined. I have time to focus fully on work. I have time to go to the gym; my health has drastically improved. Despite the fact that my sons are in a secure and healthy environment, I am aware that the influence of their current and future friends can profoundly shape their outcomes. So now, I’m also focused on ensuring their friends have access to early childhood education.  How do I make sure other parents can experience this level of healing? When we take our children to a child development center, how do we ensure their teachers have their needs met? I'm thinking about our children entering kindergarten ready so that teachers can actually teach at the current grade level and not have to be going backward.

Paula Breonne Vickers speaks at WEPOWER’s 2023 Garden Party at the Missouri Botanical Garden.

COVID exposed so many inadequacies around early childhood education. Across all of the districts, no matter the resources, no matter the color of their skin, children were all falling behind. They lacked fine and gross motor skill development, both of which you learn inside early childhood spaces.

Early childhood education has the greatest return on investment, but we’re not adequately investing in it.

Since joining WEPOWER, I’ve had countless discussions with the community about what it looks like if we’re able to secure funds for early childhood and where we think these funds should be allocated towards. In addition, much of this work is talking about the profession with the respect it deserves since this profession has historically been treated as “women's work,” especially Black and Brown women. So, it hasn't been valued. I think more parents, aunts, uncles, and even teachers should get involved in initiatives like the Power Building Academy, the Power and Policy Action Group, and even running for elected office. We need folks we trust working to help enact the early childhood education reform our community wants and needs.

Paula and son at WEPOWER’s family portrait event

I long to see a St. Louis where every child has the opportunity to thrive, where every kid in our community has access to an adequate early childhood education program.

I have a vision of a community uplifted by the potential of its youngest members, and I’m dedicated to making that vision a reality, not just for my boys, but for every child in my neighborhood. Every child deserves a chance to thrive, but they need your support to do so.

Let your voice be heard by joining the Power and Policy Action Group and help us achieve policy change and increase resources for early child education.

Together, we pull up for our babies, our communities, and a brighter tomorrow.