Dawnté Early ’05, M.S. ’08, Ph.D. ’11, spent midmorning on a recent summer day painting rocks with several 4- and 5-year-old boys. At times it got pretty messy, with yellow, red and blue combining to make a dingy brown, but that was all part of the learning process.

This KinderCamp program introduces children who didn’t have access to preschool to the classroom for four weeks in the summer. United Way runs the program in partnership with several local groups.

As president and CEO of United Way California Capital Region, Early furthers the organization’s mission to end poverty in the area. One approach is rooted in education through programs like KinderCamp. 

“What we want is for kids who maybe have just been at home, particularly during COVID time,” Early said, “to get to learn to play on a carpet, to paint, to count, to hold a pencil.”

This morning in this West Sacramento elementary school calls to mind many elements of Early’s education at UC Davis. A triple alum, Early earned her bachelor’s degree in psychology, M.S. in child development and Ph.D. in human development with a minor in quantitative psychology.

The road to the capital region

When people ask Early where she is from, she often will say Sacramento. But the true answer is a little more complicated. Early has roots in Sacramento, Folsom, Davis and West Sacramento — and she’s lived all over the world.

As a child, her parents were stationed at different Air Force bases, including both Mather and McClellan in Sacramento. She attended high school in the Azores off the coast of Portugal before ultimately graduating from Folsom High School.

For college she chose Alabama A&M but transferred to UC Davis to be closer to her family after her son was born.

“For me, education was extremely important,” she said. “Moving back, it was [important that] a school was academically rigorous but also close to home. I had a young child and wanted to make sure that I could have both a good education for myself and my son.”

She lived in student family housing on campus, among other students who had children. She also had several friends from high school nearby and said she felt like her son was welcome wherever she went.

“I feel like I kind of got the best of both worlds — I had the massive responsibility, but also was able to get some of that college experience,” she said.

As a student at first, Early pursued pre-med, envisioning a future as a doctor. An internship at a surgery lab on campus showed her that it was not for her. But another opportunity revealed another path.

“I found the McNair Scholars Program while I was at UC Davis and had no idea about it, but it exposed me to research and it exposed me to data,” Early said. “And that's really where I feel like I found like my calling, understanding, ‘hey, I'm actually pretty good at this.’”

The McNair program is designed for undergraduates who are either first-generation college students with financial need or members of another underrepresented group with great potential. For Early, it meant access to mentorship and experience conducting research, honing a love for data science.

After graduation, she was a postdoctoral research fellow at the UC Davis Medical Center in neurology. From there, she went to the state of California, conducting research for the Department of Public Health, California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation and the Department of Health Care Services.

Looking for a change

A few years ago, Early made some major changes to her professional life. In 2020, she was the chief of research and evaluation for the Mental Health Services Oversight & Accountability Commission. She also had a desire to do more on the community level.

“COVID was happening, and I'm sitting there at home, looking at what's happening with the murder of George Floyd,” Early said. “As a Black woman who has a Black father, who has a Black husband, who has a Black son, what I was seeing with George Floyd was not a surprise or anything new. We were just forced as a society to pause and watch it.”

For Early, the answer was to run for city council in West Sacramento. She won and became the first Black person elected to the city council in that town. And then a recruiter approached her about United Way.

She’s honest about questioning her own qualifications for these roles. But then she embraced the new path.

“If you feel a calling to serve your community, we should all hear that,” she said. “[We should all] feel worthy and qualified to represent our community because we have a voice and a perspective that should be at the table.”

And each new path has been successful. She was elected West Sacramento’s Mayor Pro Tem in March. And, under her leadership, United Way California Capital Region has doubled in the past two years.

At 100, the regional United Way is providing some services for the first time, including housing and guaranteed income support for foster youth. They’ve added almost 3,000 households to the Dolly Parton’s Imagination Library, a program in which every child aged 0 to 5 receives a free book every month.

Early attributes her success to her unique perspective and personal history.

“I think I understand both of the systems in place as well as community needs,” she said. “Being a mom who absolutely struggled in regard to poverty, lived in affordable housing, had WIC, had Medi-Cal, all of those things, in fact, used [United Way’s] free tax prep program. Having all of those experiences, yeah, I think has made us sort of like that special sauce in regard to our success over the past couple of years.”