Most politicians, including presidential candidates, highlight Universal Pre-K (UPK). President Biden is no different. It’s good that the President is concerned about this issue, but the plan deserves scrutiny.
Supporting families who need childcare assistance, no matter the child’s age, is critical. Offering UPK for children starting from age three may bring children together, and there are good things about this plan, but there are also concerns.
Here’s the President’s Fact Sheet.
A big question surrounding UPK is the curriculum.
Will UPK micromanage children to teach skills beyond their developmental capability?
How stressful will preschool be for three and four-year-olds? An environment like that found with the Perry Preschool and Abecedarian Project seems right, and the President’s plan mentions these programs.
But words describing preschool by New America include standards, alignment, and benchmarks. New America prominently influences UPK. Here are the New America people and their funders.
Where are groups like Defending the Early Years, Alliance for Childhood, teachers, or early childhood specialists like Rae Pica who understand early childhood research, young children, and their needs?
Putting pressure on three and four-year-olds to master outcomes designed by adults is worrisome and may negatively affect children, especially those who learn slowly.
Consider that kindergarten is now called the new first grade. What used to be a half-day introduction to school, where a child played, took naps, learned their numbers and letters, and how to tie their shoes, is now a time for nonstop seatwork and assessment to ensure students haven’t fallen behind.
Is preschool the new kindergarten?
Or that third graders are held back a grade when they fail a reading test. For years research has shown that third-grade retention laws can be detrimental. There are far better ways to help children who work slowly.
Will preschool be micromanaged? States have already signed onto Kaplan-backed Connect4Learning (C4L), which involves predesigned learning modules for young children. C4L recognizes a debate surrounding the push for content learning.
They say:
False dichotomies and fierce debates often plague the field of early childhood education. Play versus academics is perhaps the most widely cited example, with the implication being that they are mutually exclusive.
The research evidence suggests that high-quality instruction and high-quality free play do not have to compete for time in the classroom. Doing both well makes each one richer.
So, where’s that discussion?
Some play-based activities might be helpful, and if UPK is developmentally sound and children get to have free play, it could be a good program, but this isn’t clear.
What’s meant by high-quality instruction and free play, and workforce references?
Early childhood education is about nurturing young children, not manipulating how children will improve the future economy. Economists might predict the later effects of educating young children, but early learning should be about children.
One report the Biden administration cites is by the EdTrust nonprofit many educators don’t trust. They, like New America, highlight research by the National Institute for Early Education Research (NIEER).
Steve Barnett leads NIEER, called a pioneer. Barnett is an economist who has written much about education and cost analysis of programs like the Perry Preschool and Abecedarian Project. He is often a leading voice about UPK.
Barnett knows essential information about preschool. He makes some good points, but he speaks about preschool and intensive high-quality teaching. Barnett says we don’t know what that is or how difficult it is.
But well-prepared early childhood educators do know what good preschools involve.
He also claims: What we need to have is data collection embedded in the everyday activities of teachers and leaders in preschools and schools that is constantly used to improve my practice.
What does he mean?
UPK and confusion about Oklahoma and their third-grade failure rate.
President Biden’s plan mentions a 2017 Tulsa preschool study, which implies that retentions will go down, retentions that should have never occurred. It’s essential to learn which programs work well for children and Oklahoma’s schools look like they qualify. But do they?
In 2016, The Hechinger Report reported, Why Oklahoma’s Public Preschools are The Best in the Country. Numerous articles highlight their preschool program fully funded for four-year-olds regardless of family income since 1998.
But in 2018, Oklahoma was one of the top states in the nation to hold students back in early grades. The Tulsa study says that third-grade retention decreased. Did it reduce retentions there and not in the rest of the state?
According to Oklahoma Watch:
These early-grade retentions are happening more regularly in Oklahoma than almost any other state. According to the data, reported by schools to the U.S. Department of Education, nearly 10,000 students in kindergarten through second grade were retained in the 2015-16 school year, compared to just over 2,500 in third grade. That represents 6 percent of all students in those three grades, the second-highest rate among the 50 states plus the District of Columbia, according to an Oklahoma Watch analysis. Only Mississippi retained a higher proportion of students in those early grades.
Are preschools in Oklahoma pushing children to learn information before they’re ready?
The same Hechinger report states:
Critics of prekindergarten programs attached to K-12 schools have worried that such programs could become too focused on building academic skills in developmentally inappropriate ways. Drilling young children in their letters and numbers has actually been found to be counter-productive.
Who’s determining what it is that preschoolers should know and when they should know it?
America’s time is now to care for its young children without focusing on the future workforce and monetizing that care. The Biden administration can do that by considering a variety of opinions about what these programs should look like.
Virtually all the positive research efforts involved comprehensive and HIGH QUALITY PRE-K. Not solely ‘high quality instruction’, but including high quality staff and supporting cast, trained and paid as professionals, high quality home connections (multiple), high quality staff-continuity, high quality trauma-informed processes and people, open access to high quality mental health resources for both students and families, comprehensive safety net linkages for families and so much more. The research-based outcomes are amazing for HIGH QUALITY PRE-K. In contrast the outcomes are vague or non-existent for lesser quality efforts.
Sadly, the first phrase eliminated in many, if not most, political discussions and applications is “High Quality”.
Often camouflaging the elimination of “High Quality” is “Universal”, as in “Universal Pre-K”. Reality will follow the semantics. The nearly immediate elimination of insistence on and retention of the research results-driver, “High Quality” portends doom in scale-up, via “Universally” vague to non-existent results, and related funding decreases.
We must push back now, before scale-up flaws impact future funding. Excitement over current new funding can not distract us into accepting the “trade-off of quantity for quality” in Pre-K.
“Universal” quantity Pre-K is NOT the same as “High QUALITY Pre-K.,
Let’s shout it from the mountain tops: Meaningful, evidence-based supports for children require authentic, evidence-based High Quality in scale-up.
Thanks, Daun. I appreciate your comment. I worry that “high quality” has a variety of different meanings, some concerning.
Early childhood educators know what it means.
This is so true, Nancy. I once sat in the audience at the Dept. of Ed. listening to Arne Duncan talk about “high quality” PreK, and his definition was vastly different from mine.
Thanks for commenting, Rae. I think it was especially difficult for him since he never taught young children. I wish real early childhood educators could design the programs.
All this demand for high quality sounds very business like. I say “lots of love and play” is a better plan with the right attitude.
Nancy is completely correct that this program shouldn’t be micromanaged at the federal or even state levels. Just let each community do what they think is best for them.
I am afraid, the thinking is Washington is “We give a lot of money for this, so we better get our money’s worth”.
I agree, Máté! Thanks for commenting! Programs can be of high quality at the local level. Great point!
So where do we start?
“He also claims: What we need to have is data collection embedded in the everyday activities of teachers and leaders in preschools and schools that is constantly used to improve my practice.”
my take: It’s all about the DATA, and monetizing that data, to the detriment of children and their families.
When it sounds too good to be true, it is too good to be true. There is no such thing as a free lunch. By providing universal pre-k, the powers-that-be are hoovering up data for profiling/analytics, etc. This is not good for children, but someone is profiting. Is this what we want?
Excellent point, Sheila, and a huge concern. I also don’t think it’s well understood. Thank you.
“There is no such thing as a free lunch.”
This is not a free lunch, it’s paid for by us, the taxpayers. Many (most) European countries, including the poorest ones, have this “free” lunch.
Another excellent point! Why can’t our policymakers see this?
I worry – no, I am absolutely CERTAIN- that administrative teams and decision-makers in education can’t help themselves. They get so caught up with data and rigor and how their school or district looks to be performing on paper, they literally cannot help themselves. Sight words are introduced in pre-K! As far as I am concerned that is malpractice. A pre-k teacher once threw up her hands in exasperation and said to me, “She can’t write her name!” about one of her four year old students. This is much more the rule than the exception.
I can’t seem to post a photo here but if I could I would show you a New Jersey private Academy print ad boasting about their preschool: “Math every day… teaching (3 and 4 year olds) to think like mathematicians, readers and writers.”
They are not only pushing developmentally inappropriate skills but they are boasting about it. Parents have completely bought into it and are pressuring the schools.
But it’s the educators who are the experts. And it is malpractice for the “experts” in this field to be allowing and encouraging – and mandating! – this.
I agree! Please! Defending the Early Years, Alliance for Childhood and others… Let’s rescue these kids! We are robbing them blind. ????
Thank you, Phyllis. Alliance for Childhood, yes! I shall add. I appreciate your review however sad.
I worry that we will, responding only to testing (which is demonstrably illogical), will blindly pursue pre-K the way we have charged into everything else educational. We seem to think that an early start always wins. The example of a child I know makes an argument to the contrary.
He was a gifted baseball player, sought after by the colleges. then, one day, he had had enough. He did what Forrest Gump did. He just stopped. Took up the guitar. There had been too much baseball. Maybe that is OK for baseball, but I would hate to doom a population of students to burning out on learning in the 10th grade.
Thanks for sharing that story, Roy. I wonder how many children shut down because they were pushed to hard to achieve.
In the homeschool world, we call this “deschooling.” Parents who are fed up with public schools “ruining” thier children (usually mental health wise) pull them out. Both parent and child are excited about learning, but then the child doesn’t want to do anything, so the parent wonders if they made the right choice. As a teacher in this field, and a mom who pulled my children for this reason, I can tell them not to worry. Their kids need time to recover, then time to learn about themselves. They have been told what do to, when they can eat, when to use the bathroom, etc. for so long that the may have to think for a while about what they want to learn, or what style of math teaching appeals to them.. They do come around in a few months. It is so important not to force them.
From personal experience, intellectual play was vital for the development of my daughter’s reading love. It has not, however, yet morphed into the love of the classics. While Dickens may be on her radar, she still reaches for easier contemporary texts that treat contemporary issues rather than those fundamental to extended mankind.
From her birth, we read books to her and cultivated the love of reading as a fundamental recreation. So learning was play. But all play is not learning. Perhaps it should never be. Who knows how the human mind develops so that we move into the joy of a wonderful plot or an elegant proof?
Thanks for sharing, Roy. Who knows where her interest in contemporary texts will take her? I know quite a few people who disliked reading the classics when they were young. She has her preferences.
I’m don’t know how old your daughter is, but i do not remember choosing to read those texts “fundamental to extended mankind” very often. The Swiss Family Robinson was about as close to a classic as I came. They forced us to read The Heart of Darkness, Moby Dick, and assorted other classics in high school, none of which I ever remember feeling drawn to. I was too busy trying to navigate being a teenager. I f I had available to me the wide selection of YA literature there is now, I would never have come out of my room!
As one who read every Nancy Drew book on the planet, I wholeheartedly agree! Thank you!
Thanks. I wondered why she never comes up for air. The YA stuff they write now is great. I had Clair Bee sports books and that wonderful classic, Scarface, but not the stuff like Salt to the Sea, by Sepetys, which delves into the historyof the world’s most disastrous maritime incident.
Alabama has a first rate, universal preschool program that was highlighted in Mother Jones a year or so back. I visited with the director of the state program the last time I was in Mobile and the program appears to be free of high-stakes testing and the curriculum appears to be appropriate for young children. Staff training is emphasized too. Take a look at their program on their website. Impressive!
I will check on this. Thank you, Paul.
Universal PreK is in process in California. I am especially concerned about academics. We raised the age for starting Kindergarten some years ago to match the rest of the country, but at the same time implemented Transitional Kindergarten. Most of those 4-year-olds continue to First Grade because the program is completely academic (at least the ones I saw at my children’s school). I don’t get the point, then? Now everyone is excited about Universal Preschool, but it isn’t clear whether this is a daycare solution or just a way to start academics even younger. If it’s the second one, where is the research showing that is the best way to help low-income and/or marginalized populations? I would never put my kids in a school like that, so is segregation going to increase? I agree with the questions raised in the blog, too. What is “high-quality instruction”? I know what it is to me, but what does that mean to Governor Newsome? Here are a couple of links about California’s programs: https://www.gov.ca.gov/2021/07/09/california-roars-back-governor-newsom-signs-historic-education-package-to-reimagine-public-schools/ https://www.newamerica.org/education-policy/edcentral/california-universal-pre-k/
Gow. Newsome is looking to create community schools, as are states across the country. If only children had automatic healthcare and their basic needs met. Schools are trying to fulfill those needs, so I think that’s what he means by reimagining. I have some concerns about community schools. Some are called charter schools too, and many rely on outside partnerships.
But you’re right in that “high-quality instruction” isn’t clear. Let’s hope they’re not pushing skills and higher expectations.
Thanks for sharing, Beth. I appreciate the links!
Very worrisome to hear Newsom being interviewed recently about this push for pre-K and hearing buzz words for the testing/pay for success agenda
Social Impact Bonds for preschool? Really? That is worrisome.
Appears to me that these bonds put profits over kids best interest and leave the community served vulnerable if metrics of success are not met. Portland, OR now has a universal pre-k measure passed with the program being largely paid for by the higher income people. That is a much better route to take and can be done with a lot of hard work that will pay off down the line.
I wonder what the higher income people are getting back, if anything, for their investment.
I think paying taxes should be viewed as a form of dues paid to help create a thriving community. The universal pre-k program in Multnomah County, Oregon is a value added contribution by the persons with the financial means to contribute to this effort.
Yes to the wealthy paying their fair share of taxes, which might mean that school boards would no longer need their donations to fund vital programs.
As I am sure you know, Paul, this is a troubling concern with schools at this time. I welcome those who have found financial success wanting to support their local schools, as long as they don’t start dictating to teachers how they must spend those funds.
And for the record, sometimes taxpayers get swept up in paying for pet projects that change how schools work.
Thank you for such interesting information.
We do have our own Medicare for All bill called CalCARE. The voters support it, but that doesn’t mean it will be enacted. That’s the strange thing about politics these days – they don’t do what the people want at all. Both sides are owned by corporations.
I hear you. Thanks for sharing, Beth.
Developmentally Appropriate Practice❣️
Yes! Thank you, Susan!
Thank you for pointing out the distinctive nature of the programs on which much of our data about the benefits of preschool are based. Policy makers are using this data to bolster support for investment in universal PreK, but the programs they describe sound nothing like Perry Preschool or Abecedarian curriculum or staffing models. It is also worth remembering that the long term positive effects of these programs were not increased academic skills, but are social, emotional, and health related.
It will be too easy to fall into the trap of tying “school readiness” to alphabet knowledge and number sense. And far too easy to create (and sell) curriculum and assessment products that focus on these skills.
The early childhood community needs to unite and define “school readiness” as a constellation of foundational, not academic skills – to emphasize gross and fine motor development, social emotional development, oral language development (in all the languages the child speaks), and a sense of self-efficacy, wonder, and joy in learning.
Ratios, class size, teacher preparation, curriculum and assessment for publicly funded preK should all be developed in service to these foundational skills, all of which are practiced during long periods of child-directed play.
Brookings had a great piece on this a few years ago-
https://www.brookings.edu/blog/education-plus-development/2017/02/24/misrepresented-evidence-doesnt-serve-pre-k-programs-well/
They could so easily change the narrative and provide children with the kind of experiences found in the Perry Preschool and Abecedarian. How much data is needed for this?
And they could still create and sell curriculum products.
Thank you for your informative comment, Krista. I also appreciate the link.
When more is expected of children than they can deliver, all sorts of negative consequences develop. More than 15 years ago, I met a psychologist at a national conference sad that she’s been seeing typically developing children referred for developmental disability testing. As the academic pressure grows, these referrals grow as well. Too many administrators and policy makers have NEVER had even one course in early childhood growth and development. It’s so important that they are taught, and that they be required to spend time in ece classrooms.
Yes. Absolutely! Children are said to have reading problems when they never had a chance to learn to enjoy reading. And I also agree with the lack of experience of those setting these agendas. Thank you, Ellen. Great points!
My thanks to the NEPC!
https://nepc.colorado.edu/blog/universal-pre-k