San Francisco Bay Homes - Cliff Keith and Team

Universal Preschool News

Confused about the benefits or harm of Universal Preschool? Is it a silver bullet for education reform or a waste of money?
Watch this 10-minute documentary...

In this section, you'll find editorials, legislation, public policy and trends on issues relating to preschool, pre-kindergarten, childcare and the push toward universal preschool education. Particularly of note are articles concerning the states claim of a compelling interest in compulsory preschool education. Visit often for the latest preschool news.

  1     2  

Public schools follow the market, pitch all-day kindergarten | csmonitor.com It's a working parent's dream - kindergartens competing to take your children off your hands all day, and the promise that they'll learn something, too. Competition for students has always existed between public and private schools. But open enrollment, home schooling, and a growing number of charter schools have widened parents' choices, and now public schools are facing one of their biggest competitors yet - themselves. by Tim Vanderpool March 9, 2005 [More Results from The Christian Science Monitor]
Parents go to school on giving kids a good start Police take up the cry to get all 4-year-olds into preschool. The situation in San Leandro is not unique. A statewide survey of publicly funded preschool programs found anywhere from 20,000 to 50,000 children waiting for slots in either Head Start, state preschool programs or general child care - all of which serve low-income families.

Sponsored by Fight Crime: Invest in Kids California, the survey included responses from about 2,800 state programs, a 48 percent response rate. by Jill Tucker and Katy Murphy February 10, 2005 [More Results from The Daily Review (CA)]
Popping Pills in Preschool No one flinched when a child psychiatrist told a conference of parents and counselors that she had prescribed antidepressants to children as young as 3-1/2. Audience members at the San Diego conference, after all, were quite familiar with the concept of preschoolers on Prozac. Many of the parents in the audience have children who suffer from a debilitating form of shyness called selective mutism, one of a handful of mental disorders thought to strike children younger than 6. by Randy Dotinga February 5, 2005 [More Results from Wired News]
Do Pre-K Center Care Programs Work? A number of states have initiated, or are in the process of initiating, free pre-K center care programs for children from low-income families. In the case of Smart Start and Kid Stuff, the states estimate that when fully implemented, these programs will cost in excess of $300 million per year.

During the past 40 years there have been five large-scale trials conducted to investigate the relationship between pre-K and developmental outcomes in children. We will examine each of these studies to see if they support the claim that high quality pre-K contributes to the intellectual, academic, and behavioral development of children. by Verne R. Bacharach, Ph.D., Appalachian State University; Alfred A. Baumeister, Ph.D., Vanderbilt University; Jaimily A. Stoecker, M.A., C.A.S., Caldwell County NC Public School District August 1, 2003 [More Results from Eagle Forum]
Don't Cry for Me, Head Start It's been 33 years since the Head Start program was founded in hopes that it would end what President Johnson described as the "pattern of poverty." Perhaps, its founders reasoned, federally subsidized early intervention could help all children enter school on an equal footing and thereby give disadvantaged children opportunities formerly reserved to the middle and upper classes. Unfortunately, the experiment has fallen short of fulfilling that hope. by Darcy Olsen and Eric Olsen August 15, 1999 [More Results from CATO Institute]

  1     2