Giving children high-quality preschool is the first step in the journey to school success. The next steps--kindergarten through 3rd grade--are equally important. Advocates for Children of New Jersey (ACNJ) is working on several fronts to help school districts across the state build strong early learning programs, which can significantly improve children's performance in the upper grades. ACNJ's Linking Learning Initiative is an effort to coordinate and advocate for strong early learning systems at the local and state levels. To accomplish this, ACNJ is working with a broad group of educators, state officials, education associations and other stakeholders to build this quality early learning system that can help children succeed in school and grow up to be productive members of communities. This paper describes the following initiatives: (1) Linking Learning Initiative; (2) PreK-3rd Leadership Training Series; and (3) PreK-3rd Grade Lab Initiative.