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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.
Former Livermore preschool employees testify about abuses
The owners of a Livermore preschool shut down last year covered babies' faces with blankets as they slept and occasionally used those blankets to tie them to the crib, two former employees told a judge Thursday during a preliminary hearing.
Lida Sharaf, 33, and her sister, Nazila Sharaf, 36, owners of Sunnyside Preschool in Livermore, were arrested in April 2013 on suspicion of child abuse after a former employee filed complaints about the facility that included swaddling infants so tightly that they could not move their arms or legs.
March 21, 2014
[More Results from contracostatimes.com]
Pre K Scholars Launches New Website
Pre K Scholars has adopted a strategy that focuses on homeschoolers, parents of 3-5 year olds and preschool and kindergarten teachers seeking primary and supplemental classroom materials.
Pre K Scholars began in 2008 with its Teacher Kit, a comprehensive preschool curriculum with supporting instructional materials in a box that initially sold for $800.. Its target was a former teacher turned stay at home mom who would like to teach kindergarten readiness in her home. "We built the website to support that strategy. We offered signup sheets for classes and even allowed teachers to have their own webpages within our website," reflected Schwary.
March 1, 2012
[More Results from timesunion.com]
Editorial: Now not the time to cut preschool funds
Decades after 1,000 poor Chicago kids attended an intensive, high-quality early childhood education program in the early 1980s, their lives are far better than similar kids who did not, a new study shows.
This research is particularly timely as Illinois politicians tussle over a final state budget. Early childhood education, which generally gets high marks for quality, is slated for a 5 percent cut. That will translate into a loss of roughly 4,300 seats.
June 11, 2011
[More Results from suntimes.com]
New L.A. study affirms benefits of preschool
Children enrolled in Los Angeles Universal Preschool programs made significant improvements in the social and emotional skills needed to do well in kindergarten, according to a study released Monday.
The study, commissioned by the organization and conducted by the San-Jose-based Applied Survey Research, measured the readiness skills of 437 children at 24 preschools in the fall of 2008 and reassessed 364 of those children in sping 2009.
April 19, 2010
[More Results from Los Angeles Times]
Why nursery schools are bad for little boys
It is one of life's little ironies that, just as neuroscience has confirmed the huge importance of attachment in early learning, the people who once selflessly took on the role of faithful assistants to each generation are no longer available to do the jo
There has so far been little research into the emotional effects of institutionalised early care, but what there is gives cause for concern. Government researchers have noticed a "small but significant difference in a large group of children" for whom daycare led to "withdrawn, compliant or sad" behaviour or to higher levels of aggression.
May 19, 2009
[More Results from Times Online]
Questions for Candidates
As November elections approach, homeschoolers should try to find out the positions of the candidates on the issues of most importance to parents.
NHELD has compiled a short list of suggested questions. What is your position on compulsory public pre-school (universal pre-school) for infants and toddlers?
October 9, 2008
[More Results from Home Educator's Family Times]
Tangle of Funds Perplexes Preschool Providers
Funding for California preschool programs is dizzyingly complex, with money flowing from numerous state grants, each with their own restrictions, requirements and a mountain of paperwork.
Preschool providers find it logistically difficult to weave different funds together, a recognized way to create income-integrated preschools like Poway Unified's, which delivers services to kids across the economic spectrum.
March 28, 2008
[More Results from Voice of San Diego (CA)]
Let children be children | Is your 5-year-old stressed out because so much is expected?
We've just finished test time again in the schools of California. The mad frenzy of testing infects everyone from second grade through high school.
For 30 years as a teacher of primary kids, I have operated on the Any Fool Can See principle. And any fool can see that the spread between what is developmentally appropriate for 7- and 8-year-old children and what is demanded of them on these tests is widening. A lot of what used to be in the first-grade curriculum is now taught in kindergarten. Is your 5-year-old stressed out? Perhaps this is why.
June 13, 2007
[More Results from San Francisco Chronicle (CA)]
When Should a Kid Start Kindergarten?
According to the apple-or-coin test, used in the Middle Ages, children should start school when they are mature enough for the delayed gratification and abstract reasoning involved in choosing money over fruit.
In 15th- and 16th-century Germany, parents were told to send their children to school when the children started to act "rational." And in contemporary America, children are deemed eligible to enter kindergarten according to an arbitrary date on the calendar known as the birthday cutoff...
June 3, 2007
[More Results from The New York Times]
Plug of war
Conversations on the ins and outs of pacifiers can get contentious The pacifier. Despite its name, the small plastic plug seems to rile up controversy rather than calm it.
Aside from breast-feeding and circumcision, few other topics can get parents, grandparents, pediatricians and child experts so stirred up that a timeout may be in order.
May 19, 2007
[More Results from The Union Tribune (CA)]
Lawmakers quietly considering universal preschool
After California's voters last June defeated a $2.3 billion universal preschool initiative, Proposition 82, the issue of early education seemed dead. But reports of its demise have proved premature.
The debate over how much to spend on pre-K and for which kids is now in the hands of the state politicians, and the issue will resurface this week when Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger releases his revised 2008 budget.
May 7, 2007
[More Results from San Jose Mercury News (CA)]
Poor Behavior Is Linked to Time in Day Care
A report from the largest study of American child care finds that keeping a preschooler in a day care for a year or more increased the likelihood that the child would become disruptive in class - the effect persisted through sixth-grade.
Every year spent in day care centers for at least 10 hours per week was associated with a 1 percent higher score on a standardized assessment of problem behaviors completed by teachers, said Dr. Margaret Burchinal, a co-author of the study and a psychologist at the University of North Carolina.
March 26, 2007
[More Results from The New York Times]
Pre-K program lacks students
Only 56 4-year-olds are in the Brooksville summerprogram to get ready for kindergarten.
Only 56 students have enrolled so far in the program at Brooksville, Pine Grove and Westside elementary schools, said elementary curriculum specialist Elaine Wooten. While nearly 1,000 other Hernando students took advantage of a similar school-year program offered by private child care providers, she said, the summer turnout has been a disappointment.
June 28, 2006
[More Results from St. Petersburg Times (FL)]
The Price of Day Care Can Be High
There is one place in North America where parents of young children don't have to worry about child care. In Quebec, full-time day care costs just $7 a day, thanks to a government program aimed at one of the thorniest problems that workers in their 20's,
Starting in 1997, the Quebec Family Policy subsidized day care for 4-year-olds at government-approved centers around the province. By 2000, the program had expanded to cover any child not old enough for kindergarten, all the way down to infants. This is universal day care, an audacious idea that recognizes the revolution in women's work over the last 30 years.
June 14, 2006
[More Results from New York Times (Canada)]
Proposition 82 / Preschool supporters aren't giving up on their quest
Preschool advocates plan to continue fighting to increase quality and expand access to preschool, they said Wednesday, despite the resounding defeat of Proposition 82.
In 13 counties, including San Francisco, San Mateo, Santa Clara and Los Angeles, advocates already are implementing publicly funded preschool, and Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger has proposed $100 million in next year's budget to increase preschool opportunities for 4-year-olds from low-income families. "We're in this for the long haul ... and we'll work locally and at the state level," said Maryann O'Sullivan, founder of Preschool California, an advocacy group. "People are very committed and saying we need another strategy."
June 8, 2006
[More Results from San Francisco Chronicle (CA)]
Voters reject Prop. 82
California voters soundly rejected Proposition 82 on Tuesday, crushing the hopes of early-childhood education advocates who hoped to make universal preschool public policy in the nation's most populous state.
Though Proposition 82 enjoyed support in staunchly liberal enclaves like San Francisco, it was overwhelmingly rejected in the Central Valley, Orange County and other parts of the state. Reiner and his campaign aides overestimated the breadth of their support -- and misjudged the depth of the opposition's.
June 7, 2006
[More Results from The Mercury News (CA)]
Voters reject Prop. 82
California voters soundly rejected Proposition 82 Tuesday, crushing the hopes of early childhood education advocates who hoped to make universal preschool public policy in the nation's most populous state.
Throughout much of the evening, returns showed that 60 percent of voters statewide opposed Prop. 82 while just 40 percent supported it, making it nearly impossible for the measure to ever get the simple majority it needed to pass.
"It doesn't look good," admitted Hollywood director Rob Reiner, who spoke to about 200 supporters at a Los Angeles hotel ballroom shortly after 10 p.m. But he vowed to fight on, saying that the push for universal preschool would not go away. "This is important, and if it is not today the train has left the station."
June 7, 2006
[More Results from The Mercury News (CA)]
Prop 82: No, no, no
If ever a political matter illustrated the proverbial wisdom that the road to hell is paved with good intentions, it is Proposition 82.
Rob Reiner's "free preschool for all" initiative stems from the filmmaker-activist's sincere concern that many poor children's lack of early intellectual development dooms them to substandard lives. But Reiner came to believe his altruism was all that mattered - that in pursuing his crusade, he had no responsibility to forge wise public policy or to behave in ethical fashion.
June 5, 2006
[More Results from The San Diego Union-Tribune (CA)]
Preschool for All by Tricia Shore
The California crowd, a generally insecure lot who so worries their pretty heads about whether their infant is reading a Baby Einstein flashcard more quickly than their neighbor's, tends to take preschool pretty darn seriously.
Private preschools and kindergartens and such can run you $20,000 per year easily. You are often judged as a parent based on your child's preschool. Yes, the preschool. People have every right to do this, of course. I've heard many moms tell me that they dropped their three-year-old off at preschool with the little one crying for mommy not to leave. "But I had to," one mother dramatically said, "It's for his own good!" At three' That particular mother spoke two languages and yet, she evidently found it beyond her reach to think about teaching her own child the alphabet of either language. Or anything else.
June 5, 2006
[More Results from LewRockwell (CA)]
Disingenuous ploy: Reiner should stop hiding behind 'the kids'
Perhaps the most tiresome Stupid Politician Trick of all is when someone under fire declares that the real goal of his critics is to try to hurt the weak and powerless folks he protects.
This defense is so common that it's become a cliche: "I'm just trying to help the kids," said Sen. For-Sale Smith as he downplayed the $10 million that mysteriously turned up in his bank account.
March 18, 2006
[More Results from The San Diego Union-Tribune (CA)]
Ohio Infant & Toddler Guidelines Unveiled
COLUMBUS -- A leadership team of private and public organizations this week unveiled developmental guidelines for Ohio's youngest children, from birth to age three.
The "birth announcement" was held at COSI in Columbus and included remarks by Ohio First Lady Hope Taft. Designed to assist parents, providers and policy makers, the Guidelines include the following developmental domains and include best practices in the areas of: health, emotional, social, motor, language/communication and cognitive.
March 12, 2006
[More Results from PR Newswire (CA)]
The Reiner rip-off: Taxpayer-funded push for initiative reeks
It's hard to fathom how a Hollywood actor-director-activist with a reputation for caring about children could make the transition to sleazy pol so quickly, but that's just what Rob Reiner has done.
His role in orchestrating the use of millions in taxpayer money to push his latest cause is beyond slimy and way past arrogant... There's talk of seeking a state Fair Political Practices Commission investigation of this mess, but that doesn't go far enough. Attorney General Bill Lockyer, come on down. A slap on the wrist is not sufficient. The use of $23 million in public funds for a personal crusade merits a criminal investigation.
February 23, 2006
[More Results from The San Diego Union-Tribune (CA)]
Should California pay for preschool?
In June, Californians will vote on a proposal to offer three hours a day of free preschool to every 4-year-old in the state by 2010 -- paid for by a new tax on the state's highest-earning residents.
Proponents of Proposition 82, also known as the Preschool for All Act, say preschool is a sound investment, citing research showing that children who attend preschool are more likely to avoid repeating a grade, graduate from high school and steer clear of crime. Opponents say a new government-run preschool system is destined to be a costly bureaucratic disaster.
February 12, 2006
[More Results from The Mercury News (CA)]
CALIFORNIA / UC study examines preschool benefits / By third grade, no difference shown among students
As proponents of universal preschool in California kicked off their campaign with news of an upbeat poll, a study on the lasting effects of preschool indicates many of its benefits may wear off by the time students reach third grade.
The University of California study, parts of which will be released today at a Sacramento conference, focuses on non-English-speaking children who went to preschool. Students who had gone to preschool gained a head start on literacy and language skills that gave them a leg up through third grade, according to the study by UC Santa Barbara professor Russell Rumberger, director of the UC Linguistic Minority Research Institute.
January 28, 2006
[More Results from San Francisco Chronicle (CA)]
Vilsack wants preschool for all 4-year-olds
DES MOINES -- Iowa Gov. Tom Vilsack said Tuesday that he will ask the Legislature to guarantee preschool for every child.
The proposal, which would cost $15 million in its first year, would make preschool a recurring part of the state budget rather than an optional expense that must be renewed each year.
House Speaker Christopher Rants, R-Sioux City, said the governor's plan would guarantee preschool by expanding the K-12 school funding formula to include 4-year-olds.
January 13, 2006
[More Results from Quad-City Times (IA)]
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