Preschool: Partnerships and possibilities

Earlier this year, President Barack Obama provided a much-needed boost to the political will by advocating increased access to quality preschools, as research shows that high-quality preschool plays a vital role in school success.

Hawaii has been working toward this, yet we have hit some challenges.

Efforts to provide junior kindergarten for the past several years recently were deemed unsatisfactory and the program was discontinued; in conjunction with this, the law was changed, requiring that children must reach their fifth birthday by the end of July in a given year to be eligible for school entry in August, leaving many families in a difficult situation. Beginning with the 2014-2015 school year, these families will have to find space in preschool programs for their children, postponing public school kindergarten entry for a year.

Many families are concerned that there is not capacity for the children (estimates range from 3,500 to over 5,000 students per year) needing preschool services.

How can those youngsters be served by public and private preschools, home care providers, Head Start, child development centers on military bases and other early education centers?

Part of the solution may be to change laws on how tax dollars are spent. Despite criticism by the Hawaii State Teachers Association, Senate Bill 1084 was passed by the 2013 Legislature, posing the question to the taxpayers through a constitutional amendment on the 2014 ballot: Shall public funds be appropriated for the support of private early education programs, as provided by law?

The union considers this a movement toward vouchers and prefers providing a more targeted approach to preschool subsidies.

There is not sufficient capacity solely within the public school system or in the private sector to provide these programs for the new influx of children. Collaboration between the state and the private sector may be essential in solving this problem.

The state does not have the physical space, staffing allotments or program supports that will be needed to fully implement universal preschool at this stage.

Private preschools can accommodate some of the children affected by the elimination of junior kindergarten, but not all.

Time is not on our side. With or without the amendment, a partnership must be formed and something must be in place for the 2014-2015 school year.

Access to high-quality preschool is a matter of social justice. Young children who do not have sufficient exposure to language are falling behind even before they start school. Some families choose, if they have the finances to do so, to send their children to private preschools or to keep them at home. Yet even for middle-income families, there is often not enough money in the family budget to pay for preschool when both parents work.

If we truly want to create a pluralistic, democratic society, we must begin to consider preschool access an essential part of local efforts to improve education, and provide funding to improve and expand services for all our learners who need preschool.

Those of us who have been long-time advocates for public education have to expand our thinking about how access to preschool can be expanded. We must bring both public and private sector components together to build a system that meets the needs of a variety of families and their young children.

We have to allot resources, hire more high-quality preschool teachers, and collaborate to provide development so they can continue to grow as educators. And we need to hurry. Young children and their families are counting on us.