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Make America Great Again
Join Date: Oct 2006
Location: Springpatch
Casino cash: $33532
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Universal pre-K for American children: why are we not doing this?
We have extensive evidence that pre-K education programs make a huge difference in the early learning trajectories of children (David Brooks accurately cites the the Perry and Abecedarian projects as stunning successes). There's evidence that it could reduce poverty and increase the most important aspect of America: social mobility. Social mobility is why America is America -- and universal pre-K helps make that possible.
Head Start has had a difficult time showing the same kind of successes, but many states have supplemented and refined it to actually produce effective results. The Obama administration's plan is to enhance these state improvements by providing funding, and measuring their results -- in other words, it's a perfectly federalist solution. States do all the work, the federal government measures their success and buttresses their efforts financially. The key: score some incremental improvement through state experimentation. That improvement early in life becomes a key advantage later in life. http://www.nytimes.com/2013/02/15/op....html?hp&_r=1& When Families Fail By DAVID BROOKS Published: February 14, 2013 Today millions of American children grow up in homes where they don’t learn the skills they need to succeed in life. Their vocabularies are tiny. They can’t regulate their emotions. When they get to kindergarten they’ve never been read a book, so they don’t know the difference between the front cover and the back cover. But, starting a few decades ago, we learned that preschool intervention programs could help. The efforts were small and expensive, but early childhood programs like the Perry and Abecedarian projects made big differences in kids’ lives. The success of these programs set off a lot of rhapsodic writing, including by me, about the importance of early childhood education. If government could step in and provide quality preschool, then we could reduce poverty and increase social mobility. But this problem, like most social problems, is hard. The big federal early childhood program, Head Start, has been chugging along since 1965, and the outcomes are dismal. Russ Whitehurst of the Brookings Institution summarizes the findings of the most rigorous research: “There is no measurable advantage to children in elementary school of having participated in Head Start. Further, children attending Head Start remain far behind academically once they are in elementary school. Head Start does not improve the school readiness of children from low-income families.” Fortunately, that is not the end of the story. Over the past several years, there’s been a flurry of activity, as states and private groups put together better early childhood programs. In these programs, the teachers are better trained. There are more rigorous performance standards. The curriculum is better matched to the one the children will find when they enter kindergarten. These state programs, in places like Oklahoma, Georgia and New Jersey, have not been studied as rigorously as Head Start. There are huge quality differences between different facilities in the same state or the same town. The best experts avoid sweeping conclusions. Nonetheless, there’s a lot of evidence to suggest that these state programs can make at least an incremental difference in preparing children for school and in getting parents to be more engaged in their kids’ education. These programs do not perform miracles, but incremental improvements add up year by year and produce significantly better lives. Enter President Obama. This week he announced the most ambitious early childhood education expansion in decades. Early Thursday morning, early education advocates were sending each other ecstatic e-mails. They were stunned by the scope of what Obama is proposing. But, on this subject, it’s best to be hardheaded. So I spent Wednesday and Thursday talking with experts and administration officials, trying to be skeptical. Does the president’s plan merely expand the failing federal effort or does it focus on quality and reform? Is the president trying to organize a bloated centralized program or is he trying to be a catalyst for local experimentation? So far the news is very good. Obama is trying to significantly increase the number of kids with access to early education. The White House will come up with a dedicated revenue stream that will fund early education projects without adding to the deficit. These federal dollars will be used to match state spending, giving states, many of whom want to move aggressively, further incentive to expand and create programs. But Washington’s main role will be to measure outcomes, not determine the way states design their operations. Washington will insist that states establish good assessment tools. They will insist that pre-K efforts align with the K-12 system. But beyond that, states will have a lot of latitude. Should early education centers be integrated with K-12 school buildings or not? Should the early childhood teachers be unionized or certified? Obama officials say they want to leave those sorts of questions up to state experimentation. “I’m just about building quality,” Education Secretary Arne Duncan told me. The goal is to make the federal oversight as simple as possible. That’s crucial. There’s still a lot we don’t know about how to educate children that young. The essential thing is to build systems that can measure progress, learn and adapt to local circumstances. Over time, many children will migrate from Head Start into state programs. This is rude to say, but here’s what this is about: Millions of parents don’t have the means, the skill or, in some cases, the interest in building their children’s future. Early childhood education is about building structures so both parents and children learn practical life skills. It’s about getting kids from disorganized homes into rooms with kids from organized homes so good habits will rub off. It’s about instilling achievement values where they are absent. President Obama has taken on a big challenge in a realistic and ambitious way. If Republicans really believe in opportunity and local control, they will get on board. |
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#31 | |
Now it's Willie Time!
Join Date: Jun 2004
Location: Beating hippies
Casino cash: $13612
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Quote:
We have plenty of cash in the Ed budget for this. We just need to mandate that 90 cents on the dollar spent on education goes to classroom expenses. We could free up a big chunk of capital that way. If it turns out there isn't enough cash form the pre k program I would be open to spending more because I know it isn't going to pay for some administrative lackey whose workday consists of day trading and angry birds. In short, show me dept of Ed can spend money effectively and efficiently and I am happy to support funding shit like this.
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“You may think RaiderH8r is just a thinker. But I’m not just a thinker. I’m a doer. Every day I go out there, and rev that engine, fire it up, grab a hold of that line between speed and chaos, and wrestle it to the ground like a demon cobra. And when the fear rises up in my belly, I use it. Fear is powerful, because it’s been there for billions of years. And it is good. And I use it. And I ride it; I ride it like a skeleton horse through the gates of hell.” |
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#32 |
Rufus Dawes Jr.
Join Date: Aug 2000
Casino cash: $19989
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I don't plan to educate my kids in government schools, so were is the opt out for people like me?
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Posts: 11,200
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#33 |
Besides, big day tomorrow
Join Date: Aug 2000
Location: Utopia
Casino cash: $28554
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Home school is a choice. You'll use plenty of school resources.
Pay up, sucka. |
Posts: 55,927
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#34 | |
Bucs, Pats, Noles
Join Date: Apr 2006
Location: None of your business
Casino cash: $70063
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Not everyone is like you either. Quit being authoritarian about this in a free country. This is not a govt matter—there is also no Constitutional authority for the Federal govt being involved in such engineering or any education. Some kids never socialize, despite going to public school. Look at the current socialization results today from that. ![]() Do you think our Founders were unsocialized too? There's something to say for playing outdoors in open space on their own than being crammed in buildings with some authoritarian adult bossing them around on what to do.
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![]() “Preventive war was an invention of Hitler. I would not even listen to anyone seriously that came and talked about such a thing.” ~ Dwight D. Eisenhower Last edited by BucEyedPea; 02-18-2013 at 06:14 PM.. |
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#35 | ||
Supporter
Join Date: Feb 2005
Location: Olathe, Ks
Casino cash: $74227
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great...."free day care!!!"
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#36 |
Where's my WALL?
Join Date: Nov 2012
Location: Lees summit
Casino cash: $60258
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#37 |
Seeking the Truth daily
Join Date: Jan 2006
Location: In the Country in MO
Casino cash: $34409
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"The White House will come up with a dedicated revenue stream that will fund early education projects without adding to the deficit."
Tax Increases again......
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Frazod to KC Nitwit..."Hey, I saw a picture of some dumpy bitch with a horrible ****tarded giant back tattoo and couldn't help but think of you." Simple, Pure, Perfect. 7/31/2013 Dave Lane: "I have donated more money to people in my life as an atheist that most churches ever will." Come home to Jesus Dave. Come home. |
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#38 |
Where's my WALL?
Join Date: Nov 2012
Location: Lees summit
Casino cash: $60258
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Naw, I'm sure they'll cut from an existing social program to make the "investment" pay for itself.
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#39 | |
Debunking your bullshit
Join Date: Aug 2002
Location: KC area
Casino cash: $63575
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Well, bye.
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#40 |
America is great assholes~
Join Date: Sep 2001
Location: In some people's mind~
Casino cash: $28090
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Post 14~
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The Trump campaign and Black Lives Matter movement are perfect for each other. Both sides filled with easily led and angry nitwits convinced they are victims~ |
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#41 |
Seeking the Truth daily
Join Date: Jan 2006
Location: In the Country in MO
Casino cash: $34409
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"That proposal actually has several components, including financial assistance to help parents pay for infant and toddler care...."
More chilren means bigger paydays....I loves me some big gov
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Frazod to KC Nitwit..."Hey, I saw a picture of some dumpy bitch with a horrible ****tarded giant back tattoo and couldn't help but think of you." Simple, Pure, Perfect. 7/31/2013 Dave Lane: "I have donated more money to people in my life as an atheist that most churches ever will." Come home to Jesus Dave. Come home. |
Posts: 41,692
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#42 |
Where's my WALL?
Join Date: Nov 2012
Location: Lees summit
Casino cash: $60258
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#44 |
America is great assholes~
Join Date: Sep 2001
Location: In some people's mind~
Casino cash: $28090
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Yeah after collecting from them for decades the bill has come due, how many trillions are they paying in interest on for the money that was promised to be in the SS fund again?
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The Trump campaign and Black Lives Matter movement are perfect for each other. Both sides filled with easily led and angry nitwits convinced they are victims~ |
Posts: 31,085
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#45 |
Where's my WALL?
Join Date: Nov 2012
Location: Lees summit
Casino cash: $60258
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