Investing in preschool pays off in better standards
We were at a gathering last weekend where the speaker asked how many in the room were graduating from high school. A couple hands shot up. Then she went down the list. From middle school? From elementary school? And then she stopped.
Daughter No. 4 pulled on my arm and said, “She forgot to ask about preschool. That’s important, too.”
As a proud member of the preschool class of 2003, she should know. It’s convincing others that proves difficult.
I’m sure the speaker hadn’t meant to slight the youngest grads in the room because she spends her days focused on caring about children. But early childhood education has drawn the short straw in Pennsylvania for far too long that public sentiment is just now swaying toward seeing the importance of reaching young minds during the sponge stage of development.
Debates are ongoing in Washington, D.C., and in Harrisburg that center on the value of making sure little ones are prepared to enter first-grade classrooms. Much of the focus is on the federal Head Start program. The House Subcommittee on Education Reform has been listening to testimony on a bill that would do two major things to the program: increase teacher qualifications by requiring at least half of all Head Start teachers to have earned BA degrees and give states more discretion in administering the program and adopting their own standards.
Few can argue against the first provision. It’s the second part that troubles some who think states, with little oversight by the federal government, would water the program down and use the money for efforts that do little to ensure that more poorer children have access to pre-school education.
It is difficult to know how Pennsylvania would treat the program, as it is one of few states that spends no money at all educating preschoolers. The governor and lawmakers know this must change, as they and public schools are under increasing federal pressure to show better performance of kids at all grade levels. The best way to do this is to start out with better-prepared pupils entering grade school.
Providing early opportunities to kids from homes where books aren’t plentiful, where money is tight and parents perhaps are young and uneducated seems prudent.
The question, then, is how to go about doing this so that the kids truly benefit and that it is not just another taxpayer-funded program growing out of control.
Gov. Rendell proposes expanding the Head Start program, which would reach thousands of children. With more kids than slots available and growing waiting lists, Head Start probably would welcome the expansion. Others aren’t convinced that Head Start is doing as good a job as private preschools and that parents should be given what amounts to a voucher to select the school of their choice.
Both ideas have merit, but they have flaws, and reconciling the two will be difficult. Given the historical lack of negotiation and compromise by our lawmakers, the most likely scenario will be that nothing will occur this legislative session. That would be a shame.
Both parties have more than enough information before them to recognize children exposed to early education thrive and have a better chance at excelling in school. Lawmakers, like me, are fortunate enough to be able to afford a good quality preschool for their own children. They know the value, the edge it gives their own offspring. What they need to recognize is that as caretakers of Pennsylvania’s future, they need to provide that same opportunity to kids whose parents aren’t as well off.
Luanne Traud is the Herald-Standard’s editorial page editor. E-mail: ltraud@heraldstandard.com.