As I perused the biweekly newsletter I received from http://nieer.org I found several issue that are relevant to my current level of professional development listed under "Hot Topics" and "Early Education News Roundup". In a time where we are seeing an increase in childhood poverty, it is important that all children are being offered the choice of an early childhood education in order to reap all of its benefits. Within this weeks newsletter, I found it disturbing to find several articles listed declaring certain states would not pursue federal grant money for early childhood education programs. I found this quite disheartening as an early childhood educator and an advocate for children. I am hopeful because some states have decided to pursue grant funding and other states are considering it.
Under one of the same headings of the newsletter, "Early Education News Roundup", there was a particularly disturbing article for me. It was an article about Florida's public Pre-K system, and in particular their community collaborative classrooms within private preschools and child care centers. These programs receive federal funding based on their housing and educating of preschool children. The writer of the article in the Orlando Sentinel, submitted that the Florida Board of Education voted to toughen quality standards of these collaborative community programs. While I think that is a great idea, how they are doing it is completely inappropriate. They are taking standardized test score of young children entering kindergarten and using those scores to rate these community programs. I am disappointed that a state could strive so hard to create quality programs in such a poor way.
Under the heading of "Hot Topics" in the newsletter, an article was listed about the Governor of Hawaii's intentions for use of grant funds from a "Race to the top" grant. He is taking the money to open up 800 additional public Pre-K slots for children in a huge step to make Pre-K a universal choice among young children in that state. The race to the top grant funding can be allocated in many different ways. It was satisfying for me to see a politician using it to benefit children at an earlier age.
An additional item that was mentioned in the newsletter a couple of times was the fact that at least two states were considering charging families above the poverty line for preschool education. One state who had done it already, saw an increase in enrollment of low income children, but a decrease in enrollment overall. Many families are above the poverty line yet are still struggling. It is wrong to charge American taxpaying families money for their child's education; an education that should rightfully be free even at the preschool level.
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