Philly.com: Op-ed: Back Kenney on Pre-K Funds
By David L. Cohen
March 1, 2016
Mayor Kenney will deliver his first budget address Thursday. If his remarks to the Greater Philadelphia Chamber of Commerce were any indication, he will propose many different investments that will be strongly supported by the business community, including strong economic development programs and a powerful commitment to education.
Most importantly, one of the centerpieces of the mayor’s address will almost certainly be a bold call for a major investment in pre-K programs in Philadelphia.
For a city plagued by a devastatingly high poverty rate (one of the highest in the nation), pre-K is not an option – it’s a critical equalizer. Neuroscientists attest that 80 to 90 percent of a child’s brain is developed in the first five years of life. Early education can enable our most vulnerable children to break the cycle of poverty by capitalizing on the tremendous learning potential of 3- and 4-year-olds during this critical time in their development.
For a city with a struggling public school system, pre-K is not an option – it’s a vital precursor to a quality education. Countless studies demonstrate the effectiveness of pre-K to reduce the need for special-education services, thus saving millions of dollars in costs. According to the city’s Pre-K Commission, the School District of Philadelphia could save $72 million over the length of a grade cohort’s K-12 school years if all children participated in pre-K.
Expanding access to pre-K is also indisputably linked to improving academic outcomes. According to the William Penn Foundation, the percentage of 4-year-olds with proficient academic and social skills more than tripled after participating in the state’s pre-K program. And children who participated in the Chicago Child-Parent Center were 29 percent more likely to graduate from high school.
Investments in pre-K are a powerful economic engine with impacts on par with transportation and infrastructure investments. A ReadyNation report frequently cited by the Economy League found that for every $1 spent on pre-K, at least $1.79 is generated in local spending.
It is not surprising, therefore, that in sharp contrast to the partisan political dysfunction that we see so much of today, there is a broad consensus – between Republicans and Democrats, between the business community and education advocates, and among local, state, and federal government officials – that pre-K is essential to turn around our schools and support our city and our economy for long-term growth.
You just don’t hear anyone questioning the need for or positive impact from pre-K. The only question I hear is how are we going to pay for it. And with all due respect, that’s simply the wrong question. The only question is how can we afford not to pay for it?
The Pre-K Commission has crystallized the financial need – the city needs to secure $60 million a year to expand pre-K to children who lack access. That is, unfortunately, not a sum of money that is easily available in the city budget. Therefore, in order to fund pre-K, it is a near certainty that the mayor will need to propose new revenue sources. If we in the business community are serious about our long-standing support for pre-K, we can’t be dismissive of proposals necessary to pay for it.
Philadelphia has the opportunity to implement a policy that can grow jobs and businesses, attract and retain talented workers, and help public education. This is what many of us in the business community have been begging for, so we cannot be silent now. We need to embrace Mayor Kenney’s call to action, partner with him, and wholeheartedly support pre-K and the means to fund it. Together, we can provide a great opportunity for our city’s children – and for all of us.
David L. Cohen is senior executive vice president of Comcast Corp. and is a member of the Executive Leadership Council for Pre-K for PA (www.prekforpa.org). David_Cohen@Comcast.com
Read the op-ed here.
Bucks County Courier Times: Op-ed: Commitment to Pre-k Education Pays Big Dividends
By JAMIE HADDON and WILLIAM E. HARNER
February 26, 2016
“It gets late early out there.”
Yogi Berra said it about the conditions at Yankee Stadium, but it sure sounds like he was talking about early childhood education.
At United Way of Bucks County, we work to advance the quality of early education and provide hundreds of prekindergarten scholarships through your generous contributions. UW Bucks has a long history of investing in early learning and school readiness. It is one of our top priorities. In 2016, we are convening a panel to help guide and deepen our commitment to this area.
At Quakertown Community School District, our board demonstrated its commitment to early childhood education — and a great start for our community’s children — by offering full-day kindergarten to all students who are not “ready to learn” at grade level. Now, through the Pennsylvania Pre-K Counts grant, Quakertown is partnering with LifeSpan School and Day Care to give low- and moderate-income children access to a high quality, full-day, preschool program at no cost to their families.
We invest for one reason: It “gets late early.” By age 5, 90 percent of a child’s brain is developed. It is a small window of opportunity with huge possibilities and potential, but it closes quickly. We also know high-quality pre-K is not accessible to many of our young learners who need it. Bucks County is home to 14,000 3- and 4-year-olds. Only a small fraction of these children are enrolled in publicly funded pre-K programs. Many of those missing out are those at greatest risk of academic failure. In fact, last year, 4,446 kids in Bucks County lacked access to a publicly funded, high-quality pre-K program.
The return on investment is significant. We know from research (and from the results of our practice) that high-quality pre-K is one of the best investments we can make to strengthen our community and save taxpayers in the long term. It significantly improves school readiness and increases the likelihood of high school graduation. Long term, this investment in early childhood education gives us better educated citizens — adults who are ready to be contributors to Bucks County.
In fact, every dollar spent on pre-K saves $7 in remediation and other school-related costs. It’s a win-win.
Pennsylvania has taken its eye off the ball when it comes to the benefits of pre-K. Five years ago, the state reduced its funding of pre-K by 50 percent. There is still a significant funding gap. In the meantime, the United Way and other Bucks County community-based organizations have stepped up to attempt to close the gap. However, local support and effort alone is not enough to make up the difference. We need help.
Read the full op-ed here.
Sunbury Daily Item: My Turn: Giving Can Only Help Pre-K So Much
February 11, 2016
The Greater Susquehanna Valley United Way has long made early learning and school readiness priority issues. We do this through United Way programs like Wee Read, which sends volunteers into our local WIC offices to read to children and distribute information; Every Baby Needs a Lap Top (your lap, not a computer), which teaches parents the importance of reading, singing and talking to their baby; Early Learning Investment Committee, a regional group of business leaders which advocates for investment in early learning; and pre-K scholarships.
Last year, we also invested $231,642 in funding to more than a dozen community partners, as well as in United Way initiated programs, for early childhood education initiatives.
We know — and research continues to confirm — that high-quality pre-k is among the best and most cost-effective initiatives for preparing children for success in school and beyond. It has been shown to significantly improve school readiness and increase the likelihood of high school graduation and college enrollment, which means better educated adults who enjoy stronger employment opportunities and earning potential.
Unfortunately, we also know high-quality pre-K is not accessible to many of this region’s young learners, in part because state investments in pre-K programs have not been aggressive enough. There are nearly 4,200 3-and 4-year-olds in Northumberland, Snyder and Union counties and only 16 percent of them are enrolled in publicly funded pre-K. This is well below the state average of 19 percent. Many of those missing out are those at greatest risk of academic failure.
United Ways and other community-based philanthropic organizations, as well as some strong visionary business leaders, have made strong efforts over the years to promote high-quality pre-K as a critical part of developing well-educated children, strong communities and an overall better commonwealth. But philanthropy alone cannot get the job done.
As with so many efforts to strengthen our communities, it takes a collaboration. In this case, we need the commonwealth to bolster its efforts to fund high-quality pre-K programs to reach those children who are missing out.
Especially troubling in Pennsylvania is the lack of access to high-quality pre-K among children at risk of academic failure. Across Pennsylvania, there are more than 175,000 3- and 4-year-olds who are at-risk because they are in lower-income households. Yet 70 percent of these at-risk young learners — more than 120,000 children statewide — had no access to publicly funded pre-k last year.
Northumberland County alone is home to about 1,700 at-risk 3- and 4-year-olds, and three-fourths of them lacked access to publicly funded, high-quality pre-K last year. The situation is worse in Snyder County, where 83 percent of at-risk young learners lack access, and Union County, where 79 percent lack access.
Read the full op-ed here.
PennLive: Wolf, lawmakers must fund pre-K education in the #PaBudget: Another View
February 9, 2016
By The Pre-K for Pa. Coalition
A curtain raiser to the always eagerly anticipated details in the Governor’s budget address revealed that Gov. Tom Wolf remains committed to make high-quality pre-k available to more kids.
What it didn’t reveal is how to muster the political will to generate necessary new revenue to balance the budget and invest in programs to improve the long-term viability of our state like high quality pre-k education.
Wolf’s proposed multi-year commitment capitalizes on the significant new $30 million investment in pre-k already adopted by the Legislature in the budget passed at the end of December making it possible for over 6,000 children to enroll in pre-k for the remainder of this school year.
Wolf and members of the legislature should also capitalize on the energy of a diverse collection of stakeholders by kicking off the next round of budget discussions with an ambitious investment that keeps us on track to serve all at-risk kids by 2019.
In PennLive’s coverage of the Governor’s pre-k proposal, state Capitol reporter Jan Murphy wrote that “when it comes to preschool, Republican and Democratic lawmakers stand in unison in their support of providing more funding and consider it a wise investment. It also has the support from children’s advocacy groups, district attorneys and military leaders.”
She’s right.
An increasingly broad call for public investment in pre-k from Pennsylvanians of all walks of life is being fueled by the research that demonstrates that 90 percent of brain development occurs before age five.
In the extremely polarized political atmosphere in America, Pennsylvania is poised to make history because uncommon alliances are backing measures to help every child start school ready to learn.
Across the commonwealth, decorated generals and admirals are publicly touting their pre-k support because students who attend high-quality pre-k will someday be entrusted and be more prepared to accept the call to military service. CEO’s are turning up the volume of their call for pre-k because it is an efficient means of helping our state build a more prepared workforce.
District attorneys are arguing for increased access to pre-k because doing so is proven to decrease the chances that a youngster ends up in the courthouse.
This impressive cross section of Pennsylvanians is advancing pre-k because of the evidence that it’s our best shot to significantly increase the share of children who succeed in school, to cut costs for government services, and to support our state’s future economic growth.
The Pre-K for PA coalition, with its 14,000 supporters, believes that the opportunity afforded to young children through pre-k is essential to Pennsylvania’s long-term viability and is actively working to ensure that state revenues are available to balance the state budget and to invest—at a minimum—the Governor’s proposed $90 million increase for this and next fiscal year.
A bold bipartisan push for something as important as access to pre-k has the potential to significantly boost public confidence in our political process.
It would be a welcome shift away from the divisive discourse that focuses solely on political, social or ideological labels.
It’s time to get together on new ways to support investments that help grow the commonwealth.
It’s time to get behind pre-k, which speaks to Pennsylvanians and unite the many proud constituencies of our state who know our future is dependent on all kids entering school ready to learn.
The Pre-K for Pa Coalition is: Jodi Askins, Pennsylvania Association for the Education of Young Children; Joan Benso, Pennsylvania Partnerships for Children; Cara Ciminillo, Pittsburgh Association for the Education of Young Children; Donna Cooper, Public Citizen’s for Children and Youth; Bruce Clash, Fight Crime: Invest in Kids; Steve Doster, Mission Readiness – Military Leaders for Kids; Kevin Dow, United Way of Greater Philadelphia & Southern New Jersey; Blair Hyatt, Pennsylvania Head Start Association; Sharon Easterling, Delaware Valley Association for the Education of Young Children, and Steve Wray, Economy League of Greater Philadelphia
See the Op-ed here.
Reading Eagle: Editorial: Pre-K programs vital for development of youngsters
February 2, 2016
A recent report by a children’s advocacy organization in Harrisburg shined a bright light on the alarming condition of childhood education in Pennsylvania.
An article about the report by the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette appeared in the Reading Eagle under the headline “Report: Pa. lags in pre-K education.” A second headline read, “Lack of opportunities puts roughly 120,000 at risk of school failure, it says.”
Failing in school is just one of the many risks older children and adults face when they lack a quality early childhood education.
Pennsylvania trails most neighboring states in access to publicly funded, high-quality, pre-K education, with only one in six children in the state enrolled in such a program, according to the report by Pennsylvania Partnerships for Children.
The report, “The Case for Pre-K in PA,” noted that over five years, Pennsylvania dropped from 11th to 15th in the nation in pre-K access for 3-year-olds and from 24th to 30th for 4-year-olds, according to research from the National Institute for Early Education Research.
In Pennsylvania, such programs are available to 26 percent of 4-year-olds. In West Virginia, New York and Maryland, the figures are 94 percent, 54 percent and 42 percent, respectively. Only New Jersey comes close to Pennsylvania in failing to recognize the importance of early childhood education, with 35 percent.
The Republican-crafted budget that Gov. Tom Wolf partially signed in December included $25 million for pre-K education and $5 million for Head Start Supplemental Assistance Program over the previous year’s levels. That’s not enough.
The HighScope Perry Preschool Study has shown that without early childhood education, at-risk children are 25 percent more likely to drop out of school, 60 percent more likely to not attend college and 70 percent more likely to be arrested for a violent crime, according to an article on the Rasmussen College website.
“The study found that adults at age 40 who had the preschool program had higher earnings, were more likely to hold a job, had committed fewer crimes, and were more likely to have graduated from high school than adults who did not have preschool,” the article said.
A local early learning center hit hard by the budget fiasco is Live N Learn Station on South Fifth Street in Reading. It was shut for several months, we reported on Jan. 7. That means the 56 children at the center stopped learning until Wolf signed off on a portion of a Republican-crafted budget, sending needed funds to centers like it across the state.
Read the full editorial here.
Morning Call: Op-Ed: David Lewis: Expand opportunities for children to attend pre-K programs
February 2, 2016
United Way of the Greater Lehigh Valley has long made early learning and school readiness priority issues. Your United Way invests more than $850,000 in early childhood programs, including high-quality pre-kindergarten programs, for children from birth through age 5. We convene the Early Childhood Coalition with three working groups — Continuity and Pathways, Teacher Effectiveness and Family Engagement — all functioning to align our efforts to attain grade-level reading.
We know, and research continues to confirm, that high-quality pre-K is among the best and most cost-effective initiatives for preparing children for success in school and beyond. Quality pre-K greatly increases school readiness, supporting our goal to have 50 percent more students reading at grade-level by third grade.
Starting education early in youths positively affects high school graduation rates and ultimately college and career readiness. This yields more adults in our community who enjoy stronger employment opportunities and earning potential, which drives economic security in the Lehigh Valley.
Unfortunately, we also know high-quality pre-K is not accessible to many of this region’s young learners, in part because state investments in pre-K programs have not been aggressive enough. Pennsylvania is home to nearly 300,000 3- and 4-year-olds — including more than 15,000 in Lehigh and Northampton counties — but only a small fraction of these children are enrolled in publicly funded pre-K, and many of those missing out are those at the greatest risk of academic failure.
United Ways, and other community-based philanthropic organizations, have made solid efforts over the years to promote high-quality pre-K as a critical part of developing well-educated children. However, philanthropy alone cannot get the job done. As with so many efforts to strengthen our communities, it takes collaboration. In this case, we need the commonwealth to bolster its efforts to fund high-quality pre-K programs to reach those children who are missing out.
Especially troubling in Pennsylvania is the lack of access to high-quality pre-K among children at risk of academic failure. Across Pennsylvania, there are more than 175,000 3- and 4-year-olds who are at-risk because they are in lower income households. Yet 70 percent of these at-risk young learners — more than 120,000 children statewide — had no access to publicly funded pre-K last year.
Lehigh County alone is home to nearly 3,600 at-risk 3- and 4-year-olds, and more than 74 percent lacked access to publicly funded, high-quality pre-K last year. The situation is worse in Northampton County, where more than 78 percent of the roughly 2,700 at-risk young learners lack access.
Fortunately, this is a problem we can solve if state leaders begin to prioritize high-quality pre-K in much the same way philanthropic organizations have over the years. A new report issued by Pennsylvania Partnerships for Children and the statewide, nonpartisan Pre-K for PA campaign outlines a multiyear investment strategy of $470 million that will increase an additional 71,000 seats in classrooms for 3- and 4-year-olds over a four-year span in Pennsylvania.
If Pennsylvania were to follow through on the investment strategy proposed, we could make publicly funded, high-quality pre-K available to more than 40 percent of our 3- and 4-year-olds by 2019, compared to fewer than 20 percent who benefited in 2013. Just as importantly, we could reach all of our commonwealth’s at-risk 3- and 4-year-olds, helping to put them on track to academic success at an early age.
Read the full editorial here.
David Lewis is president of the United Way of the Greater Lehigh Valley.
