Funding for pre-k restored to Shelby
16 day care centers rejoice at good news
Besides Nationa l Doughnut Day, Friday was the day 16 community day care centers got word that their pre-K funding from Shelby County Schools was restored. At Red Robin Academy on Cooper, doughnuts just made it sweeter.
“In May, we had the children make signs that said ‘Save our pre-K,’ said center director Robin Mayweather. “By Monday, they’ll say, ‘Thank you for saving our pre-K.’”
Mayweather and center directors in every corner of town now have to figure out how to alert families that the money is back and that mandatory pre-K screenings start at 8 a.m. Tuesday.
“We’re going to have to find some creative ways to get the word out because we have space,” Mayweather said.
In early May, school district officials announced they were cutting 82 of 200 pre-K classrooms in Memphis, citing an $ 8 million budget gap caused by the sequestration and expiring Race to the Top grants. Within days, they had found a way to restore 29 classrooms. Two days later, interim Supt. Dorsey Hopson told the school board there was money to restore a total of 40 classes, or seats for 800 eligible 4-year-olds.
But he also said his own research showed that 70 of the Memphis City Schoolsfunded classes were not full, and 109 did not have waiting lists.
“When we start talking about right-sizing, we have to right-size pre-K too,” Hopson said.
The school district re- stored 12 pre-K classes in city schools and 25 classrooms in partner day cares. Each school classroom costs $117,490; each community site cost $89,281, for a total of $3.9 million.
In a meeting Friday morning with district officials, day care operators were told they must take attendance every day and keep their classes full. State statute limits pre-K classes to 20 children and requires they be at 90 percent capacity, an enrollment of 18 children.
“We will have 20 children because we want to do pre-K so badly,” said Mary Palmer, head of early childhood education at Southwest Tennessee Community College, including three sections of pre-K.
“I am sure everyone will be in compliance,” Palmer said. “It usually isn’t a problem, but because we had to send so many parents away, we’ll be recruiting. I am about to send a campuswide e-mail to let students know there is money for fall.”
Pre-K costs about $130 a week per child and is funded with voluntary pre-K funding the state receives from the federal government. Locally, school districts add their own money to cover the neediest children. But districts are not required to fund pre-K, and in an austere budget like this one, the discussions are intense.
“The board’s commitment to early childhood education has never wavered. I am happy they found revenue to continue,” said Kenya Bradshaw, executive director of Stand for Children. “But this is a larger community issue that we need to develop a plan for how we will provide high-quality pre-K to every child who needs it in Memphis and Shelby County.”
Last year, the MCS preK program served about 30 percent of eligible children in the city. First priority goes to families living at the federal poverty level. To make sure it was restoring service in parts of town with the largest need, it looked at poverty levels in metro ZIP codes and determined the number of classrooms it would need to serve 30 percent of the children born in 2009.
Large new pockets of poverty registered in Cor- dova, where eight pre-K classes could have been filled in ZIP code 38016 alone. With the restored classrooms, there will be three.
The problem is that the school board may operate only with partner day cares with three-star ratings. In the southeast corner of the city, where the schools are crowded, there is also a shortage of quality day care centers.
In South Memphis, calculations show ZIP code 38106 should have seven subsidized classrooms. There will be nine this fall.