New York Times on the miracles of Universal Pre-K in DC

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:This is a great point:

Unexpectedly, another big benefit soon emerged: My son was learning much more at preschool than he had at day care. That’s because — surprise, surprise — his public-school teachers are exponentially better educated and (see any causality here?) far better compensated. The average starting salary for a D.C.P.S. elementary-school teacher, even at the early-childhood level, is just over $50,000. The average salary of a day-care provider is $19,300.

I believe it has to do with paying a decent wage and respecting the work.

How is it "respecting" if fulltime parents are told to "get a real job"?

Ok, so the new person caring for your child, isn't doing a "real" job either. Right??

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:PP again. We are institutionalizing our children. We are. It's not okay.

OK. But in reality, the choice is not: should we have universal pre-K, or should we have a living wage and the societal expection that full-time workers work 35 hours per week?

Rather, the choice is: should we have universal pre-K, or should we continue to have a system where each family is on its own to cobble together the least bad solution, using its own limited resources?

You miss my point. By "solving" this problem in an unsatisfactory way, we get to say "see? problem solved. You have to work and be away from your children, but we won't fix the wage disparity and economy, so instead, here's your free childcare." I don't like that because I think it's damaging, and justifies and perpetuates the problem.

Aha. Evidently, you are a person who, when given the choice between

A. a policy that fixes some of the problem and politically actually might happen, and
B. an idea that fixes more of the problem but politically cannot happen,

picks B.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I'm the teacher who posted before. I think a big part of the issue here is that people expect someone to pick up the slack for them in terms of childcare. I'm a single mother and I pay a lot for before and after school childcare for my DD and I paid a lot for daycare before she started school. At no point did I think, "Gee, I really think the government needs to help me out here." I made the choice to have a child and made sure I had the funds to raise her. Why should my taxes go to subsidize other people's poor financial planning?

Please do everyone a favor and give your name and school so that you can be avoided as a teacher at all costs. Do you still wish corporal punishment were available in schools?

[Anonymous]

I thought PS-3 is available at only a few schools. Our IB school doesn't offer a PS-3 class, so how can that be considered universal? It's not available to us.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I thought PS-3 is available at only a few schools. Our IB school doesn't offer a PS-3 class, so how can that be considered universal? It's not available to us.

It's available at the majority of elementary schools in the city -- the schools in Ward 3 are an exception. If you want to take advantage of PS-3 but are IB for a school that doesn't offer it, you can enroll in the lottery and try to secure a spot at an OOB school that offers it -- and then switch your kid IB for PK-4 or K.

PS-3 was first introduced as Head Start, in schools serving lower-income students, which is why there are no PS-3 programs in Ward 3. I believe it's called "universal" b/c it's no longer means-tested.

I'm not sure there are actually enough spots available for every child in the city, but I know at the end of each lottery there are open PS-3 spots available at several schools.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Can anyone else back up the point flagged by 20:22? We just went from pricey daycare to pre-k, and I've kind of assumed the educational side would be similar-to-worse, because I'm comparing the pricey daycare more to private school. But maybe that's totally offbase?

Time will tell, somewhat, but I'm curious what others' experiences are...

Hard to say. My daughter learned much more academic "stuff" at daycare than she did in PK3 (highly sought after EOTP elementary). She entered PK3 able to sound out 3 letter words . . . and a year later has made zero progress towards reading (and indeed has regressed b/c they don't seem to do any pre-reading stuff at PK3). Allegedly they are developing other "skills" . . .

She really likes it, though!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I'm the teacher who posted before. I think a big part of the issue here is that people expect someone to pick up the slack for them in terms of childcare. I'm a single mother and I pay a lot for before and after school childcare for my DD and I paid a lot for daycare before she started school. At no point did I think, "Gee, I really think the government needs to help me out here." I made the choice to have a child and made sure I had the funds to raise her. Why should my taxes go to subsidize other people's poor financial planning?

Typical American cowboy mentality.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:No it isn't. The children born to those parents start off behind and usually stay that way. If I wanted free childcare for babies/toddlers, I'd move to Europe and pay a ton in taxes. In a few years, people will start demanding this too. Personal responsibility has gone out the window. When our taxes go up, we'll know why.

You can't just "move to Europe" (and work there and benefit from the superior social system). Not only America restricts immigration.

[Anonymous]

I think universal preschool is great, but I think the preschools should be based on research about what is the best kind of preschool for three and four year olds. (Lots of outside time each day in all kinds of weather, lots of art, lots of sensory activities, all learning through play in a rich language environment.

I also don't think universal preschools should be located at elementary schools. They should be able to have large fenced play areas outdoors with age-appropriate equipment and toys (riding cars, scooters, trikes, small monkey bars, etc) and large indoors spaces for rotating out imaginative play areas, cooking, science, music etc. And 20 3 or 4 year olds is way too many for the teacher to be able to give each child attention, help navigate disputes, etc. Private preschools are usually 10 or 12 per class.

[Anonymous]

I'm one who said it solves the wrong problem. The problem is not just that you cannot afford childcare. The problem is that you can't afford all of your basic choices without sacrificing something. Maybe you want to work - that's great. But you clearly can't afford to pay childcare to make that happen. That's not okay. Giving you free childcare fulfills the need YOU want, but it also solves a problem with something that doesn't work for me. I don't WANT free childcare, which means making the only choice to make ends meet, which keeps me away from my kids for 50 hours a week or so. I also can't afford all of my basic choices, either. I would like to choose to scale back my hours so that my child is not in a daycare / "preschool" setting for 8-10 hours every day. i would like that 24K you're getting in free "preschool" to pay for a nanny, or in a tax break so that I can scale back my hours. Hell, my husband's income is not a ton higher than that. I'd love to get a 24K tax break so that one of us could stay home. Why do you get childcare and I don't get what I need for my family?"

You are absolutely missing the point. The vast majority of the kids who will benefit from the "free" pre-k program do not come from middle class families who may have the option of leaving a parent at home should the government provide a 24k tax break. They come from dysfunctional homes where there are no toys or books, where they are shuffled from one disinterested (yet free or low cost) caretaker to another while their parent works one or more non-professional jobs to make ends meet. These are the kids the city aims to help with the program.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I'm one who said it solves the wrong problem. The problem is not just that you cannot afford childcare. The problem is that you can't afford all of your basic choices without sacrificing something. Maybe you want to work - that's great. But you clearly can't afford to pay childcare to make that happen. That's not okay. Giving you free childcare fulfills the need YOU want, but it also solves a problem with something that doesn't work for me. I don't WANT free childcare, which means making the only choice to make ends meet, which keeps me away from my kids for 50 hours a week or so. I also can't afford all of my basic choices, either. I would like to choose to scale back my hours so that my child is not in a daycare / "preschool" setting for 8-10 hours every day. i would like that 24K you're getting in free "preschool" to pay for a nanny, or in a tax break so that I can scale back my hours. Hell, my husband's income is not a ton higher than that. I'd love to get a 24K tax break so that one of us could stay home. Why do you get childcare and I don't get what I need for my family?"

You are absolutely missing the point. The vast majority of the kids who will benefit from the "free" pre-k program do not come from middle class families who may have the option of leaving a parent at home should the government provide a 24k tax break. They come from dysfunctional homes where there are no toys or books, where they are shuffled from one disinterested (yet free or low cost) caretaker to another while their parent works one or more non-professional jobs to make ends meet. These are the kids the city aims to help with the program.

And that is a good thing. At least those children are helped.

[Anonymous]

And what do rich parents do? Hire one disinterested sitter after another, and another. Also relatively low cost. Often they get the same results as the poor parents. Damaged children. Except the rich ones can afford the "fixit" remedies. Speech therapy, tutors, private schools, etc.

The luckiest children are cared for people who love them. Parents, family, neighbors, friends, and sometimes even paid caregivers. Money can't always buy that. Even poor children used to have someone who really cared about them. Now hardly anyone does. And we wonder where rage comes from...

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:
And what do rich parents do? Hire one disinterested sitter after another, and another. Also relatively low cost. Often they get the same results as the poor parents. Damaged children. Except the rich ones can afford the "fixit" remedies. Speech therapy, tutors, private schools, etc.

The luckiest children are cared for people who love them. Parents, family, neighbors, friends, and sometimes even paid caregivers. Money can't always buy that. Even poor children used to have someone who really cared about them. Now hardly anyone does. And we wonder where rage comes from...

*cared for BY people
sorry

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I thought PS-3 is available at only a few schools. Our IB school doesn't offer a PS-3 class, so how can that be considered universal? It's not available to us.

It's available at the majority of elementary schools in the city -- the schools in Ward 3 are an exception. If you want to take advantage of PS-3 but are IB for a school that doesn't offer it, you can enroll in the lottery and try to secure a spot at an OOB school that offers it -- and then switch your kid IB for PK-4 or K.

PS-3 was first introduced as Head Start, in schools serving lower-income students, which is why there are no PS-3 programs in Ward 3. I believe it's called "universal" b/c it's no longer means-tested.

I'm not sure there are actually enough spots available for every child in the city, but I know at the end of each lottery there are open PS-3 spots available at several schools.

This is close, but not quite true. What spurred DCPS to start providing pre-K 3 rather than "just" Pre-K 4 was the fact that charter schools such as Two Rivers were providing pre
K-3. As a parent, I pointed out to my Council Member (Tommy Wells) that if DCPS wanted to actually survive in the competition with charter schools for students, under-enrolled DCPS schools should start providing pre-K 3. Mr. Wells ran with the idea to the Chancellor, and the Chancellor embraced it and rather quickly started up the pre-K 3 programs at several Ward 6 DCPS schools. The success at those "pilot" schools lead DCPS to steadily increase the number, focusing especially on under-enrolled schools. Ward 3 schools were not included not so much because of the lack of Head Start in those schools, but because those schools have not faced an under-enrollment problem.

[Anonymous]

Oops! PP here. I'm not entirely sure the correct title of the leader of DCPS at that time was Chancellor-- maybe it was Superintendent? Anyway, his name was Dr. Janey. The DCPS leader prior to Michelle Rhee. Michelle Rhee then picked up the ball and ran with it.