The Missouri AfterSchool Network (MASN) couldn’t be more excited to announce that our very own Ashlee Liska has been selected as a 2023-2024 White-Riley-Peterson (WRP) Policy Fellow. This year’s fellows will spend 10 months developing a capstone project which will support afterschool programs and opportunities in their home state.
Liska has some experience working with policy in afterschool, including being a MASN Afterschool Ambassador, but she anticipates a lot of growth through the WRP fellowship.
“I’m looking forward to learning how to engage with policymakers and how to get a seat at tables with the right people,” Liska said. “There are also fellows from all over the place and just to hear from them and learn from them, I think will be very beneficial.”
Currently an Associate Director of Quality, Liska is heavily involved in the Youth Development Credential, and many other aspects of MASN’s work in afterschool. Her role often puts her right in the field with afterschool program directors and direct service staff.
“They know they can reach out if they need support and assistance for things other than the YDC,” Liska said. “And by building those relationships it makes them more open to talk about their struggles.”
Liska intends to take an ongoing project on licensing requirements into the fellowship as her capstone project. Current licensing policy does not distinguish sufficiently between school-age programs and early childhood childcare programs. As a result, the regulations are not developmentally appropriate for the youth served, there are unfilled staffing positions and more children sit on the waitlist.
“We’ve already been working on that as a network for the last year pretty heavily, and we’re making strides. But ideally, I should be able to show progress towards that end goal,” Liska said.
Two other MASN team members have been selected to complete the fellowship during previous years. Casey Hanson, now with Kids Win Missouri, was MASN’s first White-Riley-Peterson Fellow in 2014. Natalie Hampton, MASN’s current associate director of policy, still meets with people she completed the fellowship with for support. Her capstone project was focused on acquiring more state-level funding for afterschool.
“This project definitely helped us make progress and gave me a reason to talk to various legislators to brainstorm with them about potential funding mechanisms,” Hampton said.
She also explained the benefits of the fellowship as a progress, not perfection kind of program.
“I think a lot of it really is about being supported and finding ways to be supportive to other people,” Hampton said. “And that’s something that Ashlee already does naturally.”
Visit the Riley Institute’s website to learn more about this year’s fellows.
