Massachusetts Babies Coalition

10/21/2026

For , we are shining a spotlight on some of the incredible work being done in infant and early childhood mental health spaces.

The Sankofa Infant Mental Health History Project™ is a multi-year effort led by Indigo Cultural Center, focused on retrieving the healing and relational wisdom from our pasts, cultures, and communities and telling a fuller history of Infant Mental Health.

Their upcoming film, Sankofa Part One, uses interviews with Infant Mental Health professionals to explore cultural frameworks and perspectives that challenge and revitalize our understanding of healing and the infant mental health field.

🔗Learn more at: https://hubs.ly/Q04BX8cy0

The Sankofa Infant Mental Health History Project™ is a multi-year effort led by Indigo Cultural Center, focused on retrieving the healing and relational wisdom from our pasts, cultures, and communities and telling a fuller history of IMH.

10/19/2026

When a baby is born, a parent, a mother, a father, a caregiver is “born” too, and so is a relationship that will shape how that child comes to know relational safety, love, and belonging. Babies grow and thrive within the context of these relationships, and relationships thrive in the context of and inside communities. That means a baby’s mental health cannot be separated from the wellbeing of the people caring for them, or from the conditions caregivers live in.

When parents face perinatal mood and anxiety disorders (PMADs), the answer is not to “fix” individual families but to surround them with care and supports that are easy to reach and free of shame.

This week, we carry that message forward. Families already hold deep wisdom about raising their children. Our work is to listen, share power, and build systems worthy of that trust.

Learn more about Celebrate Babies Week at https://hubs.ly/Q04ByV8N0

10/09/2026

Celebrate Babies Week (October 19-23) is a week dedicated to celebrating expectant parents, babies, caregivers, and the professionals who support them. Over the last two years, Celebrate Babies Week has received official recognition by the Governor.

This year, we are once again coming together as a community to request a Proclamation from Governor Healey's office for Celebrate Babies Week 2026.

The MA Babies Coalition and the Massachusetts Association for Infant Mental Health (MassAIMH) will submit a proclamation request to the Governor's office to officially recognize Celebrate Babies Week 2026 across the Commonwealth.

🔗Sign on to the proclamation request: https://hubs.ly/Q04zHF510

10/01/2026

There is still time to make your voice heard.

MA Babies Coalition has submitted our public comments on the proposed federal rule that would replace the current Head Start Program Performance Standards. In our comments, we shared the perspectives of Early Relational Health and Mental Health from pregnancy through early childhood and highlighted the importance of the comprehensive services and supports that Head Start provides to children and families.

Now, we invite you to join us. Submit a public comment by October 6 and share why the changes would hurt children, families, programs, and communities.

🔗 https://www.federalregister.gov/documents/2026/08/07/2026-16134/reducing-federal-burden-for-head-start-programs

Head Start is never just early education. For infants, toddlers and young children, it’s often the first place a caregiver’s stress gets noticed and held, where a mental health consultant sits with an educator to support understanding and responding to a child’s behavior or a home visitor connects with a parent who needs support with their mental health needs. This relational work is the program, not an add-on.

The proposed federal rule to rescind and replace the Head Start Program Performance Standards would gut this.

MSPCC's mission is to nurture early relational supports towards thriving children and families, and that work rests on the same premise Head Start does: children thrive when the adults around them—parents, caregivers, educators—have the support and resources to show up for them well. Head Start puts that same insight into practice at national scale, reaching families during pregnancy and through a child's earliest years with the developmental and relational supports, mental health consultation, and family partnership that prevent crises rather than respond to them after the fact.

MSPCC stands with Head Start.

We need your voice! Submit a public comment by October 6 and share why the changes would hurt children, families, programs, and communities.: https://hubs.ly/Q04yZmDV0

09/10/2026

Head Start is never just early education. For infants, toddlers and young children, it's often the first place a caregiver's stress gets noticed and held, where a mental health consultant sits with an educator to support understanding and responding to a child's behavior or a home visitor connects with a parent who needs support with their mental health needs. This relational work is the program, not an add-on.

The proposed rule to rescind and replace the HeadStart Program Performance Standards would gut this. Mental health services, comprehensive screening, and staff-to-child ratios all disappear under the new standards- and with them, the conditions that make co-regulation, building healthy attachment, and early relational health possible. Babies and young children can't wait for a delayed referral or a caseload too large to notice them. Their development happens now, in relationships.

The Massachusetts Babies Coalition stands with the MA HeadStart Association and the HeadStart community across the Commonwealth. We know that stripping these standards doesn't reduce the burden - it moves the burden onto babies who can't advocate for themselves, the caregivers holding them and the HeadStart workforce who daily works on behalf of promoting early relational wellbeing.

We need your voice! Submit a public comment and share why the changes would hurt children, families, programs, and communities: https://hubs.ly/Q04x9dL90

07/23/2026

When no system is responsible for the whole child, the responsibility moves to families. It's time that we build systems that families can actually navigate, not because families are not strong, but because strength should not be a requirement for access.

Incredible words from Natalie Cintron at this year's Strolling Thunder MA.

07/14/2026

Right now, there are nearly 400,000 children under the age of six that call Massachusetts their home. Every one of these babies already arrived here, reaching because that's what babies do. They cannot wait for a better fiscal year.

Incredible words from Lisa Garcia, Director of Early Relational Health at Neighborhood Villages, at this year's Strolling Thunder MA.

07/09/2026

At Strolling Thunder, we invited each attendee to share their "why". Why babies? Why Families? Why Community? and Why Mental Health?
Because every person has the ability to support the health of the earliest relationship, and every person comes to this work through a different calling. That is one of the most beautiful things of infant and early relational health.

What is your why?

06/26/2026

06/26/2026

The first Strolling Thunder MA was a huge success and we couldn't have done it without you! Thank you to everyone who came together to make this inaugural event possible.

Gratitude to Representative Marjorie Decker for your sponsorship and to Representative Christopher Worrell for your partnership. Thank you to both of you for your leadership and standing with us and for your powerful stories.

To our families and babies who showed up, who spoke and shared their voices, you are our collective why!

Every baby is a whole person, right now- already carrying the wisdom of the families and cultures they're born into.
Babies are nonpartisan. They are here now and their voices carried by families and communities belong in the halls where decisions are made.

The Massachusetts Babies Coalition is here, and we are here to stay.

We will be back for Strolling Thunder again next year!