In fall 2008, PPL-convened a forum titled: “We Agree: Now What? A community conversation about the importance of early childhood education and how it can be made accessible to all families.”
Art Rolnick, Senior Vice President and Director of Research of the Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis delivered the keynote address. He spoke of early childhood development as economic development and proscibed that the state needs to be investing its money in it. Eighty-five people were in attendance, including parents, educators, and agency leaders, there to brainstorm and collect ideas for more direct action.
Rolnick was invited to kick off the discussion, based on his extensive writing about the education system’s “failure” to ready children for school. He says many begin at a disadvantage and never catch up. This keeps them in low-skill, low-paying jobs and many experience trouble with the law. Other social costs include the need for more special education services.
To encourage ideas and input from the audience, the Q & A forum was facilitated by Todd Otis, President of Ready 4 K, and augmented by panel members and presenters that included PPL’s Early Wonders Preschool director, a family childcare provider, a parent and PPL resident, an elementary charter school principal, and Rolnick.
Discussion was lively; questions included: What can parents do if they are not well-educated themselves? What’s keeping kids out of preschool programs? What can we, as a cross-section of the community, do to remove those barriers?
One Somali mother, a recent immigrant voicing her thoughts through a translator, said “my husband and I work fulltime and the aid allows only $2/hour to pay for childcare. We cannot afford an educated babysitter.”
Another mother remarked “I waited a year to get my child into a program, and now his English is so much better than my neighbors’ children. They ask me, why? How is he speaking Spanish and English so well? People need to learn about these programs, and we need more of them, so there is no waiting.”
The consensus among the group proved to be that when it comes to “access” to school-readiness programs, more of both money and communication are needed.
The audience then divided into smaller groups to talk about what could be done and PPL recorded these conversations to help decide just “what is next.” As a result of the forum and collaboration with mission-similar agencies, we can expect further information and calls to action from PPL.
September, 2008
Comments included: What can parents do if they are not well-educated themselves? What’s keeping kids out of preschool programs? What can we, as a cross-section of the community, do to remove those barriers?