Last week, I raised questions about early learning’s role in the debate over overhauling the federal law governing K-12 education, and now there are a few sites to read and watch for answers in the coming months.
The debate is just getting started and we will update this site with new resources and news.
Paying Preschool Teachers: Education.com offers an insightful look at why salaries are so low in the early learning industry in Is Your Pre-K Teacher Giving What They Get?
“There’s no job you would hire anybody for that if you paid half the going wage, you would expect to get the same results. Yet, that’s what we do with preschool programs.”
(Adele) Robinson (director of Public Policy for the National Association for the Education of Young Children) points to Florida as an example of underfunded preschool programs. There they have universally available Pre-K, but according to Robinson, the legislature wasn’t invested in the concept. “They give so little money to a provider per child that you couldn’t possibly achieve high quality,” she says, “and then they’re assessing them in kindergarten and saying, ‘Oh my, why aren’t they ready?” – Education.com.