Pre-K

Those British accents sure make them sound intelligent, but are preschoolers in England smarter than American preschoolers? Associated Press reporter Nancy Zuckerbrod posed the question last week. Zuckerbrod and her family just moved to London, and she was surprised to find that her charming 5-year old daughter was "behind" academically according to the standards of her prospective English primary school. Back in Washington, D.C., where Zuckerbrod's daughter attended publicly funded pre-k, she had been a star student: curious, played well with others, an all-around good kid. Meanwhile, peers her age in England, the school told Zuckerbrod, were expected to be reading by themselves and understand fractions.

Boost for Pre-K in Michigan

Michigan Governor Jennifer Granholm (D) signed legislation on Wednesday that will boost funding for the state pre-k program, the Great Start Readiness Program, by $10 million. This is far short of the $31.5 million Gov. Granholm had asked for, which would have expanded the program to 7,000 more children. The program currently serves more than 25,000 low-income children across the state.

Massachusetts Governor Signs Universal Pre-K Into Law

Universal pre-k is now a reality in Massachusetts -- on paper, at least. Last week, Massachusetts governor Deval Patrick signed the Act Relative to Early Education and Care, which formally establishes a Department of Early Education and Care and establishes a pre-kindergarten program available to all three- and four-year olds in the state. The bill, however, does not come with funding for new pre-k classes. Massachusetts boosted its pre-k budget by $3 million this year, though a state budget shortfall thwarted proposals for much more substantial increases. Nearly 18,000 - or about 10 percent - of the state's three- and four- year olds are enrolled in public pre-k classes.

Over the past few weeks we’ve looked at kindergarten redshirting, when parents delay children’s entry to kindergarten for a year after the child is eligible to start kindergarten because they don’t think the child is ready for school yet. Overall, the evidence suggests that holding a child back a year is unlikely to confer lasting educational benefits, and does carry potential costs parents may not be aware of. Yet ultimately this is a personal choice for parents, often a difficult one, and we respect the choices that individual parents make based on their children’s needs and the options available to them.

Like clockwork, you can count on the New York Times to reliably run articles about the cutthroat competition among wealthy Manhattan parents for space in the city's limited supply of elite preschools and elementary schools. And today, a headline in today's NYT proclaims "Where the Race Now Begins at Kindergarten." As more and more wealthy New York parents choose to remain in the city after having children, growing the city's population of preschool and school-aged children, the story tells us that competition for slots in elite schools has become increasingly fierce--so much so that some wealthy parents are settling for slots at--gasp!--less well-known or newer private schools. The slowing economy and Wall Street's woes apparently haven't hit demand for preschools with tuition that rivals Harvard's, in large part because these programs are seen as the first step in a path that leads to Harvard.

To be sure, it's interesting to read about the early education struggles of the wealthy. But it's too bad the nation's newspaper of record devotes so much space to this extreme end of the early education market, and writes relatively little about the wide range of early education issues that affect a lot more parents and children. Maybe they just don't have any better ideas.

So here, Early Ed Watch offers 5 alternative story ideas for NYT editors on early education:

The pending reauthorization of the No Child Left Behind Act will provide the next president an opportunity to substantially reshape federal education policy. To provide a preview of what that change may look like, the New America Foundation invited education advisers to the Republican and Democratic presidential candidates to speak about their candidates' education policy agendas. Lisa Graham Keegan is a former Arizona superintendent of education who advises Sen. John McCain. Jon Schnur is former education adviser to President Bill Clinton and Secretary of Education Richard Riley, and an unofficial adviser to Sen. Barack Obama's campaign. Richard Lee Covin, director of the Hechinger Institute on Education and the Media at Teachers College, Columbia University, moderated the discussion.

Massachusetts Law to Establish Coordinated Early Ed System

State legislators in Massachusetts are reviewing the text of a pair of bills that would support the state's efforts to establish a universal pre-kindergarten program (known as MA UPK) by outlining program quality standards, establishing quality measurement procedures, and creating a statewide, 40-member early ed advisory body. Though the bill does not give specifics regarding these standards, it reaffirms the state's commitment to provide diversified pre-k services for all three- and four- year olds. Massachusetts boosted its pre-k budget by $3 million this year, though a state budget shortfall thwarted proposals for much more substantial increases.

A back-and-forth exchange about teacher quality in the USA Today editorial pages last week illustrated the current stalemate in our public policy debates about teacher quality. The USAT editorial board noted that teacher performance evaluations in many school districts are lacking in rigor and largely meaningless. In an "opposing view," newly elected AFT President Randi Weingarten argued that the editorial board and like-minded critics "scapegoat" teachers, since factors apart from teacher quality, such as class size and student socio-economic background, also affect student performance. The discussion mirrors a long-standing dispute in education policy between those who believe teachers should be held accountable for student test scores, and those who believe it's unfair or unwise to hold teachers accountable for student outcomes that are also influenced by factors teachers can't control. But new tools that can measure the quality of teacher-child interactions in the classroom may be rendering that debate obsolete.

Louisiana Governor Signs Universal Pre-K Bill

Gov. Bobby Jindal (R) has signed a bill that would extend the state pre-k program, L4, to every 4-year-old in the state. The program is currently available for about 10,000 low-income children. But that doesn't mean Louisiana is ready to join the Universal Pre-K club just yet--first the legislature would have to appropriate enough funding to provide pre-k for all 4-year-olds. Currently only three states--Oklahoma, Georgia, and Florida--offer universal pre-k, although others, including D.C., New York, and Illinois, are working to get there.

There's a substantial body of evidence documenting the short term benefits of pre-k programs. Children who attend quality pre-k programs enter kindergarten with stronger literacy, math, and social skills than similar peers who did not attend pre-k. There's very little disputing this, even among individuals and organizations that oppose public investment in pre-k programs.

Short-term pre-k impacts are important, but policymakers and parents who invest in pre-k ultimately care most about the long-term impacts these investments have on children's outcomes. That's a more complicated question, as a back and forth I've been having with the Cato Institute's Adam Schaeffer illustrates.