Logic vs. Emotion

Remember that time in Finding Nemo when the dentist brags about how he found Nemo "struggling for life out on the reef, and I saved him!"

That well-meaning dentist is our school board, and they want to "save" all the fish.

Building a pre-school to help underprivileged children sounds like a great idea right? I mean who wouldn't want to help all these cute little kiddos?

Feeling warm and fuzzy in support of a preschool!

Former board president Ryan Brault claims that large numbers of Pasco students come to kindergarten 2-3 years behind grade level and having never held a book or a pencil. When asked how to improve tests scores and graduation rates, he said he felt our best option was to build a mega-preschool.

In fact the entire school board has been shedding public tears over the disadvantaged preschool students  in our district. They included a pre-k center on the bond that failed in 2011. This could have been in indicator that voters didn't think pre-k was the best place to spend our tax dollars. But the board was not dissuaded from their goal. Despite not getting voter approval, they took 7.5 million dollars last spring and set it aside for the building of  a giant pre-school (the total cost of the preschool was estimated at 15 million dollars, but the board is hoping to get matching funds from the state- yeah the same state that our board claims is failing to fund k-12).

Feeling a little bit disenfranchised by my elected representatives.

It's no surprise that not everyone supports this idea.  The board claims we can't afford to fairly pay the teachers we already have. They have failed to provide curriculum for the students we already serve. Buildings like New Horizons are in unconscionable disrepair. We are over crowded and bursting at the seems. In many ways we are failing the students we are currently responsible for, yet the board feels the best use of our money is to bring in even more students!

Mouse droppings in classrooms at New Horizons High School
Photo credit: Eric Hayes

It doesn't really seem like the best use of funds at this particular moment does it?

Fortunately the community has made a pretty big fuss, and the school board appears to be listening. They've actually scaled back their plan a considerable bit. They recently announced that they were looking at purchasing a building and renovating it (for $2.5 million of our dollars plus another $2.5 million in hoped for matching state funds) to make a pre-school center. Monetarily speaking this is a much more fiscally responsible idea.

Cautiously Excited!

I'm excited that the board is looking at other options and that the price tag has come down dramatically. I love the idea that our community could support the needs of our population. This feels like a solid compromise. It feels good.

But million dollar decisions shouldn't be based on feelings. They should be based on fact. Just because this new idea is better than the last doesn't mean its actually a good idea.

I love children. I LOVE adorable, chubby, little, baby-faced preschoolers!

Oh  my gosh! Can't you just eat these little darlings up!

I want what's best for them. What is REALLY BEST, not just what FEELS GOOD.
So what is best?

Starting to get confused again.... having doubts....

Are we sure pre-school is even a good idea? While we are here squabbling about making sure our kids haven't fallen behind, other countries are actually trying to slow down early childhood education.  In Finland (where test scores and international rankings are nothing to sneeze at) children don't even start kindergarten until children are seven years old. The country has just began compulsory "pre-school" starting at age six. SIX!!!

Read more about it: HERE    and    HERE

We are trying to load up 3 and 4 year olds on a bus to make sure they get to their mega pre-school in time to learn to read. While our more successful European friends are keeping kids out of school until they are much older, and even then they focus on play and social skills. Not reading and writing.

Amy Phillips claims that pre-school will have the single most powerful long-term affect on student achievement. But research doesn't exactly back that up. Unfortunately their are no studies showing whether having curriculum is important (apparently in every place but Pasco that is already a given). But there are studies showing a lot of other contributors, namely quality teachers and parental involvement.

Here's a report that the number one factor in school success is good teachers:click HERE
And another one: HERE
And here's one that sites parent involvement as the number one factor in academic success: HERE
And another one that points out parents as the key: HERE

If improving educational opportunities for all of Pasco's kids is our goal, then quality teachers and parent involvement need to be on our list of things to get done. But how?

A lot of the issues surrounding attracting quality teachers have begun to be addressed thanks to the recent teacher strike:  providing adequate instructional resources and supplies along with competitive wages. Now how do we improve parent involvement? For the sake of brevity let's just look at this issue in respect to pre-school and kindergarten students. If the goal is parent involvement shouldn't we be focusing on helping parents become better teachers in their own homes? Wouldn't bringing books to the children be more beneficial than bringing the children to the books? (The READY for Kindergarten program does this, and it's amazing! Read more HERE!)

But under-privilaged kids need pre-school, right? To reduce the achievement gap, right? It would be wrong not to help them.

Now I have guilt!

First let's recognize that public schools are charged with the task of providing an education to children in grades k-12. That's it. They do not have a mandate to provide school to children under the age of five. BUT for the sake of argument lets assume that getting kids an early start would make providing that k-12 education easier later on. Let's assume that kids MUST go to preschool and talk about ways to make that happen.

Many parents simply put their own children in private preschool. What if parents can't afford it? What if the preschool can't provide for the special needs of a child with a disability?

There is actually already a program in place that serves low income and/or disabled children in our community. It's called Head Start and ECEAP. And it's a great program!   Read more about it HERE.
Families qualify based on need and students get an amazing preschool education that includes whole family activities and classes for parents (remember how important that parent involvement thing was?).

What about kids who aren't poor enough to qualify for head start? Or what if their parents work and can't take them to pre-school. What about the kids who are just in daycare all day?

I'm glad you asked.

This year our state legislature passed a law requiring ALL state licensed day-care facilities to provide preschool type services.  Seriously!  All licensed day-care centers have to also be preschools. So all those kids who are sitting in day care all day long are actually already going to be getting to go to preschool!

I'm confused. Why are we building a pre-school?

Who is left? What kids are we talking about that still need access to a pre-school and don't have it?

The answer is none. NONE.

Pasco school district is trying to do something that feels good, but it MAKES NO SENSE.
Building a pre-school for underprivileged little children feels like a good idea. Unfortunately when you take away the emotion the logic behind it doesn't stand up to scrutiny.


The good news.... if we don't need to build a pre-school, there is still plenty of money left in the bucket to relocate New Horizons! Let's get 'er done!