Education Week - February 5, 2014 - 18

Pre-K Remains Hot State Policy Topic
Governors, legislators
press early education
By Christina A. Samuels
Early education-a continuing element
of President Barack Obama's education
agenda highlighted in last week's State
of the Union address-appears to be
maintaining legislative momentum at
the state level this year, where lawmakers
around the country will deal with
healthier budgets.
In California, state Sen. Darrell Stein-
berg, a Democrat, has proposed a $1 billion
expansion of the state's transitional
preschool program, which just started in
the 2012-13 school year for students who
missed the state's kindergarten age cutoff.
Mr. Steinberg wants the program to
be available to all 350,000 of the state's
4-year-olds.
On a much smaller scale, Hawaii's Democratic
governor, Neil Abercrombie, has
asked state lawmakers to approve a budget
that would create 32 preschool classrooms,
serving 640 children.
And even states that appeared to be
philosophically opposed to state-funded
early-childhood education are considering
a move in that direction: Idaho Rep.
Hy Kloc, a Democrat, has proposed a
three-year voluntary pilot program in five
schools in Idaho. Other preschool proposals
in the state have failed, but Mr. Kloc said
he has received support for his $1.4 million
program not just from early-education advocates,
but from law enforcement officers
and school superintendents.
"The groundswell has been incredible,"
said Mr. Kloc in an interview. "People who
can afford preschool send their kids to preschool.
And for parents who can't afford
preschool, this is a way for them to make
sure their children get the equal education
that is promised to them in our [state] constitution."

'A Far Better Year'
The Education Commission of the States
released a report in January that said 30
states and the District of Columbia increased
appropriations for state-funded
preschool programs for fiscal 2014, marking
a second straight year of additional
pre-K investments. State funding grew by
$364.7 million, for a total of $5.6 billion,
which represented a 6.9 percent increase
over fiscal 2013.
The increased spending in early-child-
hood education comes after several years
when money was shifted away from such
programs, said W. Steven Barnett, the director
of the National Institute for Early
Education Research at Rutgers University
in New Brunswick, N.J. NIEER's latest
preschool report covers the 2011-12
school year, and notes that state funding
had fallen by $400 per child compared with
the previous year, bringing funding down
to an average of $3,841 per child despite
stagnant enrollment. In 2011-12, about
1.3 million children were enrolled in statefunded
preschool, according to NIEER.
In contrast, lawmakers in many states
are currently debating not whether to fund
early-childhood programs, but how much
to give, Mr. Barnett said. New York Gov.
Andrew Cuomo, a Democrat, for example,
has proposed a $1.5 billion increase over
five years to provide universal prekindergarten
for 4-year-olds; New York City
Mayor Bill de Blasio, also a Democrat, is
seeking state approval to tax high earners
in the city in order to pay for preschool and
after-school programs. His proposal would
collect about $530 million over five years.
"This is a far better year than we've seen
in a long time," Mr. Barnett said.
But in certain states, some of the increases
currently proposed are "just getting
states back to where they were," Mr. Barnett
said. Sometimes, the competing proposals
reveal uncertainty in the numbers:
New York Commissioner of Education
John King testified before the state legislature
last week that full-day preschool
could cost the state $1.6 billion a year, far
less than Gov. Cuomo's proposal.
Bruce Atchison, the director of the Early
Learning Institute at the Denver-based
Education Commission of the States, said
that increased funding is only part of what
states are expected to do in this year's legislative
sessions. He said that states may
also make moves to improve their governance
structures and create a seamless
"P-20" education continuum, or they may
bolster their early-learning quality standards.
Half the states currently mandate
kindergarten entry assessments, which are
given to children when they start school
and are intended to guide teachers in de-
PUSH FOR
FUNDING
Early-childhood education
has been a high-profile topic
for governors and state
lawmakers this legislative
season. Among the proposals
that are in the works so far:
California: Democratic Sen. Darrell
Steinberg, the president of the California
state Senate, wants to expand preschool
to all of the state's 350,000 4-year-olds,
at a cost of $1 billion a year.
Hawaii: Gov. Neil Abercrombie, a
Democrat, has asked for $4.5 million
to open 32 preschool classrooms across
the state that would serve 640 children.
Indiana: The House of Representatives
overwhelmingly approved a $25 million
voucher proposal that would give lowincome
families in five counties money
to enroll their children in preschool.
Kansas: Republican Gov. Sam
Brownback wants the state, over five
years, to pick up the full cost of all-day
kindergarten at a cost of $80 million.
Kansas currently pays for half-day
kindergarten.
Michigan: Rick Snyder, the Republican
governor, proposed in his budget
address adding $65 million to the state's
preschool program for low-income,
at-risk children.
Missouri: The Missouri Preschool Project,
a competitive-grant program providing
startup funds for districts that want to
expand their preschool classrooms, would
see an increase from $11.7 million to
$31.7 million under the budget proposal
of Democratic Gov. Jay Nixon.
SOURCE: Education Week
18 | EDUCATION WEEK | February 5, 2014 | www.edweek.org
termining what extra assistance a child
may need. More states may enact policy
about such assessments, Mr. Atchison said.
"I think we are turning a corner in the
country, and people are starting to get it,"
he said. "We have over 50 years of pretty
solid research on this."
Federal Efforts
The federal government is continuing
its own efforts to support early learning.
In his 2013 State of the Union address,
President Barack Obama proposed a
$75 billion program that would support
states that wanted to expand their preschool
offerings. At his address to Congress
a year later, Mr. Obama said he was
repeating that request, but that he wasn't
going to wait on Congress to take action.
"Thirty states have raised pre-K funding
on their own. They know we can't wait. So
just as we worked with states to reform
our schools, this year, we'll invest in new
partnerships with states and communities
across the country in a Race to the Top for
our youngest children," Mr. Obama said.
The recently approved fiscal year 2014
budget bill provides $250 million for another
early-learning Race to the Top competition;
20 states now share in the federal
money from previous competitions.
Early education enjoys a broad base of
support from organizations beyond the
traditional advocacy groups. That is true
in Michigan, where "there's no question
[funding increases] would not have happened
without the support of the business
community," said Doug Luciani, the
president and chief executive officer of the
Traverse City Area Chamber of Commerce.
Michigan allocated $65 million to its
early-childhood preschool program for
children from low-income families in the
previous fiscal year. In his January budget
address, Republican Gov. Rick Snyder said
he would like to appropriate an additional
$65 million to eliminate waiting lists.
"Our governor didn't need any convincing
on the effectiveness," said Mr. Luciani,
who is the co-chairman of the Children's
Leadership Council of Michigan. "What he
really wanted to know is if he would have
political cover if he put this in the budget."
Mr. Luciani cited universal pre-K and
high-quality child care as the ultimate
goals in Michigan. He predicts that Mr.
Snyder's proposal will be approved.
"The state has the money, it was successful
last year, and lawmakers, far from
being vilified for creating a nanny state,
have been widely praised," Mr. Luciani
said.
Philosophical Split
Currently, nine states have no publicly
funded preschool. For them, the issue may
not be funding but philosophical opposition.
In Idaho, for example, Mr. Kloc said that
the opposition argues that preschool is a
family's responsibility. Other objectors say
the state should focus on different educational
priorities.
Mr. Kloc said his bill is intentionally
small and time-limited, to allow lawmakers
to see if preschool can work in the state.
"I believe in taking small steps just to be
able to convince people who have already
had their minds made up," Mr. Kloc said.
"Eventually, with the groundswell I've
seen, [preschool] will come here. I hope it'll
be this session and if not, I'll be back with
the same bill again."
BLOGS www.edweek.org/go/blogs
Georgia Loses Access to Nearly
$10 Million in Race to Top Funds
| POLITICS K-12 | More than six months after the U.S.
Department of Education told Georgia it planned to
withhold nearly $10 million of the state's Race to the
Top grant over teacher-evaluation problems, federal
officials have done just that.
Effective Jan. 15, Georgia lost access to $9.9 million
of its $400 million Race to the Top grant-money that
the state promised in its winning application to use for
a merit-pay system tied to new teacher evaluations. The
state has eliminated that merit-pay plan, has chosen
not to appeal the department's decision, and is forfeiting
the money-at least for now.
This marks the first time the federal department
has withheld money as part of its signature, highprofile
Race to the Top contest. Georgia and 10 other
states plus the District of Columbia shared a $4 billion
jackpot in 2010.
Georgia Department of Education spokesman Matt
Cardoza said that the state chose not to appeal because
it has until September to resubmit a merit-pay play and
possibly get the money back. Any unused Race to the
Top money reverts to the U.S. Treasury in 2015.
-MICHELE McNEIL
Luna Declines Re-Election Bid
For Third Term as Idaho's Chief
| STATE EDWATCH | Idaho Superintendent of Public
Instruction Tom Luna announced Jan. 27 that he will
not seek a third term in 2014. At his announcement,
the Associated Press reported, the Republican
said that not running again would actually help
the policies promoted by the state's Task Force
for Improving Education, which issued broad
recommendations for K-12 changes last August.
Those recommendations, which he planned to
implement, would do better, according to Mr. Luna, if
they weren't attacked by opponents in the course of a
re-election effort on his part.
Mr. Luna was first elected as state superintendent
in 2006, then re-elected in 2010. He survived a recall
push after that second election, but his tenure will
always be remembered in part for his failure to
obtain voter approval for the "Luna Laws," which
the legislature passed in 2011. Those laws, which
included new restrictions on collective bargaining in
the state and more money for technology in schools,
were defeated as ballot initiatives in 2012 after stiff
opposition from teachers' unions.
The survival of the Common Core State Standards
might come into question with Mr. Luna's departure
at the end of the year. He's been a consistent defender
of the standards, which have aroused some opposition
in Idaho. Roughly a month ago, on Dec. 20, Chiefs for
Change, an affiliate of the Foundation for Excellence
in Education that promotes data-based teacher
evaluations and school choice, announced that Mr.
Luna had become a member.
Teachers' Union Wants Removal
Of N.Y. Schools Superintendent
| CURRICULUM MATTERS | The board of the New York
state teachers' union has delivered a unanimous "no
confidence" vote on state education commissioner John
B. King Jr. and demanded his removal, one more blow to
the common-core standards effort in the state.
Meeting in Albany on Jan. 25, the 80-member board
of the New York State United Teachers also declared its
opposition to the way the common standards have been
implemented and called for "major course corrections to
its failed implementation plan."
The union has argued for many months that teachers
have not uniformly had enough time to get acquainted
with the standards, or curriculum designed for them,
before being judged on how their students perform. The
board's vote now faces a vote by delegates of the rank
and file of the 600,000-member union in April.
-CATHERINE GEWERTZ
-ANDREW UJIFUSA
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Education Week - February 5, 2014

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