EarlyStories » Georgia

When Evidence is Inconclusive: Does Pre-K Work?

RLeeColvin — Mon, 22 Jun 2009 02:43:53 +0000

The state of Georgia spent more than $216 million on a program to help low-income children get ready for kindergarten, and yet state auditors cannot find any proof that the program is working, according to a story in the Atlanta Journal Constitution.
The program in question is aimed at “at-risk” children — a number that applies to about 40,000 of the 78,000 children enrolled in the state’s pre-k program and whose families qualify for welfare or other similar programs.
That story raises questions about the audit and its methods in Georgia, which in 1995 became the first state in the country to provide pre-k to all four year olds in the state who want to participate.The story notes that state auditors could not evaluate how effective the program is because it did not track how well the children served in the program performed in kindergarten.
The study follows yet another inconclusive study by Georgia State University researchers in 2005-06, although other studies have described many benefits and Georgia is still considered a leader in early childhood education.
What is happening in these programs? Along with auditors, journalists need to ask questions about the quality of programs in the state. Why aren’t children being tracked more efficiently to yield answers and what kind of research is needed to make sure answers are forthcoming? According to Pre-K Now,
Georgia served some 74,000 four-year-olds during the 2008-09 school year. What difference will it make to children now that the state is requiring all teachers to have a child developement associate certificate>? How will programs that serve poor and needy children be evaluated in the future so lawmakers, taxpayers and the general public understand more about how they are working?

What Happens Inside a Pre-K Class? A Rare Glimpse

RLeeColvin — Wed, 29 Apr 2009 04:04:13 +0000

EarlyStories keeps a close watch on the way journalists cover — or ignore — early childhood issues. The majority of stories we see tend to focus on funding battles, so it comes as a nice surprise when we come across stories that take us into classrooms. It’s especially critical at a time when federal stimulus dollars will funnel $100 billion into early childhood education, public schools and colleges — the largest one-time amount earmarked for education in U.S. history.
Ryan Blackburn of the Athens Banner Herald in Georgia this week wrote the kind of story that allows the public to get a sense of what is happening inside a pre-kindergarten program and why it might be important. The story included an interview with the teacher describing exactly what students should know by this time of year — for example, they should be able to recognize small from large and be able to name the things they see in at least 30 pictures.
The small, but nonetheless important detail gives the public a sense of what students should be learning in pre-k, and it describes how the teacher is tracking the progress of each student to decide if they need extra help in a summer program before they start kindergarten.
“In kindergarten, there’s less self-directed play, called center time, than pre-K students are accustomed to,” Carolyn Wolpert, an Early Reading First coordinator, told Blackburn. “There’s also more math and science concepts they must learn, so the more chances they get to prepare for the first day of class in the fall the better off they’ll be.”
So now the reader can understand what children need to be ready for kindergarten. For another illustration of how critical the early years are, check out Maria Glod’s Washington Post story about student performance on on the National Assessment of Educational Progress exams, showing that nine-year-olds posted the highest scores ever in reading and math in 2008.
But as Sara Mead over at Early Education Watch notes,”the real test is whether the today’s 9-year-olds will sustain their pre-k and elementary school learning gains into middle and high school. It’s too early to say with any confidence that they will (our middle and high schools do need to improve their performance) but it’s also much to early to assume they won’t. Educators and policymakers must work to continue to build on the improvements we have made in the preK-3rd years, by expanding access to quality pre-k, full-day kindergarten, and implementing aligned, high-quality curriculum and instructional programs across the preK-3rd continuum…”
That gives journalists a charge: visit these classrooms and find out what the teachers are trying to accomplish. Follow up, and see how the children who attended the programs do when they get to kindergarten, and ask teachers if they have noticed a difference. Ask for studies, and try to find out if school districts are tracking progress — and if so how. All this will go a long way toward helping the public understand what happens during these critical early years.

And what about the children? Some ideas for Georgia

RLeeColvin — Fri, 06 Mar 2009 02:55:33 +0000

As Georgia mulls spending stimulus money, an advocate weighs in to try to keep the focus on the state’s children, whom she says stand the most to gain.
Lauren Waits, policy director for Voices for Georgia’s Children, examined in a piece for the Daily Citizen how the stimulus money might be spent to directly improve the lives of children. Waits describes different ways the money can help, noting that the stimulus would provide Georgia with $82.8 million to subsidize child care for low income working families in a state that has never been able to serve all of its eligible families.
“These new dollars can help eliminate waiting lists for services and expand the eligibility level so more parents can be assured of safe, healthy environments for their children while they go to work,” Waits wrote. The remarks come at a time when Georgia’s Governor Sonny Perdue has said he might turn down hundreds of millions of dollars in federal economic stimulus money because he says it might not be in the state’s long-term interest to accept it.

A Tale of Two Pre-Kindergartens And Some Questions Worth Raising:

RLeeColvin — Thu, 26 Jun 2008 06:10:22 +0000

(New study shows Oklahoma’s public pre-kindergarten to be effective)
Two interesting and very different studies have emerged this week on pre-kindergarten quality and effectiveness, including a surprisingly critical finding from Georgia,the first state to offer universal pre-kindergarten.
The state once hailed as a model, it seems, no longer leads the the nation in enrollment, high-quality standards or per-pupil spending, according the report by the Southern Education Foundation, picked up in the Atlanta Journal Constitution.
Pre-school access in the state is limited by a new population growth, including an influx of new immigrants.Georgia’s per-pupil expenditure now ranks 22 against 38 other state-funded pre-kindergarten programs, the report notes, leaving lots of unanswered follow-up questions for journalists.
A study of 3,500 children in Oklahoma, meanwhile, found that pre-kindergarten programs set children up for later success in school, by strengthening reading, writing and math skills. The study published in the journal Science also found the state’s pre-kindergarten program to have relatively high standards, pay and benefits to well-qualified teachers.
Participation in Tulsa’s public pre-school program increased cognitive development significantly, along with pre-reading, writing and math skills, the study found. Children who participated in Head Start also improved their cognitive skills, though less dramatically.
William T. Gormley, lead author of the study, is the co-director of the Center for Research on Children in the U.S. (CROCUS) at Georgetown University. He believes a strong preschool program can lessen “negative effects,” of family and environmental risk factors. Copies of the report are available at the AAAS Office of Public Programs at 202-326-6440 or
scipak@aaas.org.
Oklahoma has been an interesting state to watch because more of its 4-year-olds attend public pre-school than in any other state. Other studies have also found that Oklahoma’s program improves children’s language, literacy and mathematical skills; including a December, 2006 report from the National Institute for Early Education Research (NIEER) at Rutgers University.

Poverty and Pre-K in the South

RLeeColvin — Wed, 31 Oct 2007 07:42:22 +0000

Two reports within days about the South that, in a way, show two sides of the same coin. A report from the Southern Regional Education Board notes that the 15-state region leads the nation in offering publicly funded preschool and then quantifies that claim. Mississippi’s Jackson Sun editorialized about the report. The Southern Education Fund this week issued a report saying that a majority of students in the region are poor. Seems like one is related to the other.

Double Spending on Pre-K in Georgia?

RLeeColvin — Thu, 03 May 2007 14:57:48 +0000

Maureen Downey in the Atlanta Journal Constitution uses a study by the Economic Policy Institute to argue that the state should abandon two tax cuts–for homeowners and the elderly with incomes of $150,000 or more–to pay to double spending on the state’s pre-k program. The money would increase enrollment and increase quality, by raising per pupil spending from $4,000 to $6,300.