District of Columbia

If you read this blog regularly, you probably know that quality is critical in early education programs. While high-quality pre-k programs have been shown to produce significant learning gains and long-term benefits for participating children, poor quality programs do not produce such results. Regular readers of this blog will also be familiar with structural factors that are linked to pre-k quality, such as qualified teachers with at least a bachelor's degree and training in how young children learn, or small class sizes and child:adult ratios.

The holidays have given me some time to finally read through the Five-Year Action Plan for the District of Columbia Public Schools that Chancellor Michelle Rhee released in late October. (Yes, I know, I'm clearly a girl who knows how to have a fun holiday season.) (Yes, I know, I should have gotten to it sooner.)

There's a lot of good stuff in there, but one glaring omission that really troubled me: A total lack of attention to early education. The word "preschool" appears exactly once in the document, as part of a series of early education programs given a passing mention in a section dealing with parental engagement. Pre-kindergarten or early childhood education? Not a mention. Kindergarten? Nope. On the upside, early literacy does get mentioned twice, and Rhee is proposing a solid, research-based approach to early literacy, including increased use of tiered interventions for struggling readers.

Last month, the District of Columbia Council took an important step towards making universal pre-k a reality in the District by passing Pre-Kindergarten Expansion and Enhancement Act. This new, comprehensive legislation seeks to provide pre-k to every 3- and 4- year old in the District whose parents want it by 2014. The legislation is good news for kids and parents in the District of Columbia, but it's just the first step. Now the District faces the even greater challenge of building a high-quality District-wide pre-k system out of the current network of disparate programs providing early education and care in the nation's capital.

The Department of Education recently released the second year impact evaluation of Washington, D.C.'s Opportunity Scholarship Program. This federally funded program--a fancy name for vouchers--provides randomly selected low-income students living in the District of Columbia a scholarship, or voucher, worth up to $7,500 to attend the private school of their choice. The report has generated response from national and local political figures on both sides of the voucher debate. D.C. Congressional Delegate Eleanor Holmes Norton believes the program should be cut because of school accountability issues, while Council Member Marion Barry supports the program because he believes it increases educational opportunities for D.C.'s children. The fact that the D.C. Opportunity Scholarships Program is up for Congressional reauthorization further intensifies these debates. Beyond the political rigmarole, we at Ed Money Watch believe that the program, and the resulting study, should continue through the full five years to further inform the debate surrounding voucher programs and their impact on academic progress.

Just seven months into her tenure as Chancellor of the District of Columbia Public Schools (DCPS), Michelle Rhee faces a major test over her plan to close 23 underenrolled public schools. After years of enrollment losses to charter school competition and families leaving the District for the suburbs, Washington, D.C. desperately needs to consolidate its school facilities to match capacity to enrollment. But parents and community-members strongly oppose closure of their neighborhood schools. [slideshow]

The case for school closures is typically made in economic terms: excess facilities are a financial drain on the District and underenrolled schools lack the resources to deliver quality educational programs. But school closure--and the resulting restructuring of remaining schools that absorb students, teachers, and in programs from closed buildings--also offers an important opportunity to catalyze reform.

On January 3, New America Early Education Initiative Director Sara Mead testified before the D.C. Council on the need to improve proposed "Pre-K For All" legislation. The prepared text of her remarks is posted below: