A task force that's working on an early learning plan requested by the governor suggests adding "voluntary, universal preschool for all 4-year-olds" to the state's definition of basic education.
ADVERTISEMENT
Read Up and Have Your Say
There's lots of great information on the Department of Early Learning's Web site about the early learning plan that's being worked up ahead of the coming legislative session, including an early outline of recommendations. Read more about it, and chime in.
Chime in online by clicking on “give your feedback” at the top of the Early Learning Plan page (www.del.wa.gov/partnerships/elac/elp.aspx), or attend one of the two public meetings left in the Puget Sound area:
Nov. 10 6:30 to 8 p.m. Educational Service District 121, 800 Oakesdale Ave. S.W., Renton
NOTE: This is a statewide meeting that will be held in each of Washington's nine regional Educational Service District buildings with help from the K-20 Network, which is used in hundreds of locations across the state to connect people in the education community who are collaborating on projects.
Interested in what other parents have been saying? Read these summaries of three meetings held in late October:
• The New School at South Shore, Oct. 28: www.del.wa.gov/publications/elac-qris/docs/Mtg_south_shore.pdf
• Tacoma Community College, Oct. 29: www.del.wa.gov/publications/elac-qris/docs/Mtg_tacoma.pdf
• Martha & Mary Early Learning Center, Oct. 29: www.del.wa.gov/publications/elac-qris/docs/Mtg_silverdale.pdf
Check back on Dec. 1, when the Department of Early Learning delivers the early learning plan to the governor and posts it on its Web site.
Preschool for All: Will the Dream Come True in Washington?
Early Education Advocates Committed to Starting with Disadvantaged Kids
By Elizabeth M. Gillespie
When Gov. Chris Gregoire signed a sweeping education bill into law this past spring, almost no one in the room had the slightest clue she was going to veto a provision that would have added preschool for low-income and other disadvantaged kids to the state's definition of basic education.
It was a tough call for a governor known for being a champion of early learning. She made her decision that morning, her advisors say, and before she wielded her veto pen, she called Bette Hyde, head of the state Department of Early Learning.
“You're not going to like this phone call,” Hyde recalls the governor saying. “I just can't do it,” Gregoire said. “I can't have it just for at-risk kids.”
Hyde argued that making universal preschool happen by starting with at-risk kids would be much like what the state did with all-day kindergarten: beginning with schools that had the highest poverty rates, then expanding it to all schools as money became available. But the governor wasn't persuaded.
“She said – attorney that she is – ‘That's not what this legislation says. It doesn't talk about all kids,'” Hyde recalls.
In the days to come, Gregoire's office was bombarded with hundreds of angry e-mails, and she was roundly criticized by groups like the Children's Alliance, which characterized the veto as a needless step backward.
In a letter she soon sent to Hyde and Randy Dorn, the state's superintendent of public instruction, the governor called on them to develop a comprehensive early learning plan for the coming legislative session, one that would “ensure that all Washington children and their families have the benefit of early education” from birth to age five.
“I am firmly committed to the principle that a basic education program should be open to any child needing the program, regardless of income,” Gregoire wrote.
She asked for specifics: What will be the starting point? How will the state pay for it? And what would be a stable source of revenue?
Hyde and Dorn assembled a task force that has been meeting weekly for several months, outlining goals that touch on everything from early literacy programs and kindergarten assessment to health, nutrition and support services for pregnant women and early childhood oral health.
In an early draft of recommendations that are due on the governor's desk by Dec. 1, the task force recommended that Washington's definition of basic education include “voluntary, universal preschool for all 4-year-olds” – meaning that all 4-year-olds would have access to preschool, but not be required to go. Poor kids would be the first in line – those whose families earn up to 185 percent of the federal poverty level. Based on 2009 poverty guidelines, a family of four earning up to $40,793 would qualify.
The task force said state and federal funding for at-risk preschool programs for kids from birth to age 3 should remain a high priority as universal preschool is phased in. In the near term, the task force suggests expanding the state's preschool program for the poor – the Early Childhood Education and Assistance Program, or ECEAP – to cover all low-income and at-risk 3- and 4-year-olds not served by the federal Head Start program.
Those who argue for getting universal preschool started with at-risk kids cite numerous studies showing that an up-front investment in early education pays major dividends down the road. Kids who go to preschool wind up less likely to drop out of high school or commit crimes and more likely to get college degrees and become productive taxpayers.
Is the task force setting up a showdown with the governor by standing its ground and insisting that the state start with at-risk kids?
Hyde and other early learning advocates don't think so. “This is not an either-or. It's an and-and,” Hyde said. “Yes, (Gregoire) wants to do something for at-risk kids, but not just for at-risk kids.”
Rep. Ruth Kagi, (D-Shoreline), chairwoman of the House Early Learning and Children's Services Committee, agrees. She thinks Gregoire will support a plan that starts preschool with at-risk children as long as there's a clearly stated goal that all kids deserve it.
By starting with at-risk kids, the state will “provide a pathway for getting to universal pre-K when we have the resources to do so,” Kagi said. “There's nothing in the constitution that says you have to do everything instantly.”
The hard part will be figuring out how the state will pay for it. The price tag will depend on what kind of preschool programs are used; some include health screenings and family support services while others are much more basic.
There's no widespread consensus on how much universal preschool might cost. According to one estimate by the Human Services Policy Center at the University of Washington's Evans School of Public Affairs, the initial cost of phasing in access to early learning programs for all kids, birth to age 5, is $54 million a year, while the full statewide cost would be about $378 million a year, or about 5 percent of what the state currently spends on K-12.
Rep. Skip Priest (R-Federal Way) notes that the state is already underfunding local school districts for K-12 basics to the tune of $1.5 billion to $3 billion. That's one of the reasons why he and other early learning advocates had pushed for giving the neediest of kids access to preschool first.
“If (the governor) wants to include all kids under basic education, that's OK with me,” Priest said, “but then she has to pay for it, and that's the challenge.”
Two years ago, an effort to start with an even smaller and needier population of kids – foster children – failed in the Legislature. Dr. Abe Bergman, a longtime pediatrician and founder of the Harborview Foster Care Health and Early Learning Project, said the fear was that focusing the preschool push on such a small segment of the population might detract from the goal of making preschool a universal thing.
Bergman questions the political pragmatism of trying to make preschool happen for all kids. “The idea is absolutely wonderful, but the perfect is the enemy of the good,” Bergman said. “My political philosophy is to get on first base … not hit a home run.”
Over the next month, the early learning plan task force is holding several public hearings, hoping to get input from parents, preschool teachers, kindergarten teachers and others. The draft recommendations released in late October don't spell out how much preschool or other programs might cost. Those numbers are still being crunched and will be in the plan the governor gets on Dec. 1, said Amy Blondin, spokeswoman for the Department of Early Learning.
“We can't just hand the governor a wish list and say, ‘We don't care how much this costs, just do it,'” Blondin said. “We have to work within the economic realities our state is facing right now.”
As tough as times are, hopes are high. Some say early learning is getting more attention now than it's ever gotten, and that the work that's underway on many fronts could put the state in a good position to win some of the $10 billion President Obama has said he wants to dedicate toward improving early learning programs over the next decade.
“This is an unprecedented time of planning for early learning in Washington state,” said Hannah Lidman, a senior policy associate with the Seattle-based Economic Opportunity Institute. “As far as I know, there has been nothing like this in the past around early learning and child care, where you had folks from the private sector, folks from the public sector, the governor, the Legislature and advocates all engaged … in such a long-term planning process.”
Elizabeth M. Gillespie is managing editor of Seattle's Child and mother of an infant and a 3-year-old.
