Pre-school smart investment for improving students’ lives
Dr Cherrie Short on moves to create a ‘cradle-to-career’ approach to pre-school childcare in California where many parents are priced out
IN HIS first State of the State address to a joint session of the California Legislature, Governor Gavin Newsom stated that it is his intention to have California provide all low-income, working families with full-day, full-year, early childhood education and daycare.
The governor articulated universal pre-school as part of an ambitious, multi-pronged “cradle-to-career” system of education in the state, particularly while on the campaign trail.
Yet how aggressively Governor Newsom will pursue this goal remains to be seen, as he has spoken with restraint about universal prekindergarten (pre-K) education since his election.
Pre-school is a smart investment. Studies continue to demonstrate the positive impact it has on students’ lives.
Research has shown that pre-K education improved fourth-grade reading scores in Oklahoma, and boosted cognitive function among students in other states.
Researchers at the University of California, Irvine, Columbia University and Penn State University have found that vocabulary at age two predicted how prepared children would be for kindergarten.
Children with a larger vocabulary at that age also tended to enter kindergarten with higher math and literacy levels, which sets them up to succeed in the K-12 education system.
Furthermore, the study also demonstrated that pre-K graduates also display greater behavioural selfregulation and fewer anxiety-related behaviour problems, such as excessive worrying and extreme shyness.
Based on this overwhelming evidence, policy makers and educators generally agree on the importance of access to early education for children from every socio-economic status.
The problem lies in how to fund it and how to incorporate pre-K into the K-12 education system. Darleen Opfer, the education director at the Rand Corporation, a policy think tank, believes that these are the issues that truly challenge the implementation of universal pre-school and childcare.
Similar to pre-school in the UK, for the most part, the heavy burden of paying for early education in America falls on the shoulders of individual families.
The literature on this topic states that families with average or low incomes should pay no more than seven per cent of their income on care and education for children under the age of six.
Pre-school, however, can cost a family as much as $1,000 a month per child, sometimes more.
The high cost helps explain why more than half of the nation’s three and four year olds miss out on preschool. The reality is that many families can’t afford pre-K education and most states lack the money to fund pre-school for all children.
The biggest impact of this high cost and lack of funding falls on the children of families who are poor, speak English as a second language, or are otherwise underprivileged, even though they are the children who would benefit most from a quality pre-K education.
But it’s not only low-income children that would benefit from pre-K education; middle class children struggle too, and we know the importance of affordable early childcare and the difference that preschool education makes to every child’s development.
Universal childcare and pre-k education would enhance overall school performance, improve children’s health, and reduce crime.
The state of California already spends $1.2bn to subsidise preschool for low-income California families, and it has improved the reach of these programs, but still too few families have access. As of now, almost one third of California’s four year olds aren’t enrolled in pre-k education programme.
Gov Newsom’s proposed budget calls for spending and additional $1.8bn on several cradle-to-kindergarten initiatives. Much of the money would come from an unrestricted tax revenue windfall expected this year.
His plan is inclusive of programmes that serve infants, toddlers and preschoolers, which helps to prevent the otherwise-predictable, political fight between champions of child care and champions of preschool.
His budget would help to decrease the gap in access to early education.
Last month, Assemblyman Kevin McCarty from Sacramento also introduced a plan to add $1.4bn a year to California’s pre-school budget. This would allow every lowincome three and four year old, as well as kids from “middle-income families who are just outside the income limits”, to attend free prekindergarten.
It’s very encouraging to see Governor Newsom and Assembly member McCarty put forward serious budget proposals to fund universal pre-K education. It hopefully means that we are headed toward the reality of universal, early childhood education and childcare in California, which are necessary to ensure equal access to opportunity for future generations.
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