Georgia’s popular pre-k program
• Launched in 1992 for families below a designated income level, opened to all families in 1996 and administered by Bright from the Start: the Georgia Department of Early Care and Learning. Has served more than one million students.
• During the 2011-12 school year, 82,868 children (about 59 percent of the state’s 145,000 4-year-olds) attended 3,909 classes. Classes are in public schools, private and nonprofit child-care centers, military bases and other education centers.
• In 2012-13, funding provided for 84,000 children in 3,818 classrooms. Classes operate 170 days per year, five days per week, 6.5 hours per day, with a maximum 22 students per class.
• Pre-k teachers are required to have a bachelor’s degree in early childhood education or a related field. (Teacher certification is not required, but 76 percent of pre-k lead teachers are certified.)
• Curriculum is aligned with Georgia’s Pre-K Content Standards, Georgia Early Learning Standards (birth-age 3) and Georgia Kindergarten Common Core Georgia Performance Standards. A new set of standards will be released in the spring that are for children birth to age 5 and that align with the new Georgia Common Core Performance Standards.
• Funding comes almost exclusively from Georgia Lottery proceeds — $301 million in 2011-2012, $299 million in 2012-2013.
Georgia’s pre-kindergarten program would be 180 days a year again, and all day-care workers would be subject to FBI fingerprint checks, under early-childhood initiatives set to come before lawmakers in January.
The nationally lauded pre-k program saw a mass teacher exodus in 2011 after Gov. Nathan Deal pushed through budget cuts to it and the HOPE scholarship, popular programs that rely almost exclusively on lottery-ticket revenue. Deal said changes were needed because rising costs and flattening lottery sales threatened the programs’ long-term viability.
But in the last legislative session, at Deal’s request, lawmakers added back 10 of the 20 pre-k days that were cut in 2011, a move that partially restored teacher salary cuts and slowed job turnovers. This session, they’ll be asked to add 10 more days, returning the pre-k program to its original 180-day calendar.
Bobby Cagle, who oversees pre-k as commissioner of Bright from the Start: the Georgia Department of Early Care and Learning, said he’s “cautiously optimistic” the governor’s recommendation will be approved.
The financial picture for pre-k is better, largely due to the Georgia Lottery Corp.’s banner year with $3.8 billion in ticket sales, Cagle said. That provided $900 million for HOPE and pre-k, $55 million more than the previous year.
Cagle is expected to lobby to change state law to require all day-care employees to have background checks based on FBI fingerprint records.
Currently, only center directors are subject to the FBI checks, which can uncover records of crimes in any state, Cagle said. All other day-care employees need only in-state background checks that are based on information such as name and date of birth, he said.
“These are not sufficient,” Cagle said. “I know from my prior experience in criminal justice and social work that many folks who have criminal records move, especially if their crimes are serious and involve children.”
Nationally, there’s momentum to more closely scrutinize day-care and child-care workers, who care for about 11 million children age 5 or younger. A bill Sen. Richard Burr, R-N.C., introduced in 2011 would mandate federal fingerprint checks for all day-care workers. It will be reintroduced in the next Congress, a Burr spokesman said Thursday.
The Department of Health and Human Services’ Office of Child Care also sent a memo in September 2011 encouraging states to implement comprehensive background checks, including FBI fingerprint checks, for centers receiving government subsidies. Alabama, Florida and Tennessee already require the FBI checks.
DECAL recently closed a Bibb County day-care center where the director had not had the required FBI fingerprint background check and had a record of multiple felonies in Florida, said Reg Griffin, agency spokesman. Another employee had an out-of-state felony record that would have been detected under Cagle’s proposal, Griffin said.
Details of the legislation are still being formulated, including whether current employees might be exempt, Cagle said.
Cost is an issue. The FBI fingerprint check would replace the state background check, but it costs about $52, about $20 more per person.
Pam Tatum, president and CEO of Quality Care for Children, said the FBI fingerprint checks are “definitely a good idea” for child safety. But she said child-care centers are under great financial pressures with higher vacancy rates, registration fees and immigration checks for employees.
“I’m not sure how many more increased costs they can bear,” said Tatum, whose association helps parents find quality, licensed child care and is working with about 300 centers on quality standards.
Another concern is the time the FBI fingerprint checks could take and the impact that could have on centers that need substitute teachers on short notice, she said.
Cagle acknowledged the cost of the FBI fingerprint checks is “a major consideration. We know if we change the rules, we could cause some to go out of business,” he said.
“For me, it’s a matter of weighing child safety against other factors.”
Pat Willis, executive director of the advocacy group Voices for Georgia’s Children, said, “Yes, there is cost involved. But I think it’s a legitimate cost. And parents expect the people caring for their children have been checked.”
Approximately 6,300 child-care programs in Georgia have an estimated 30,000 employees and potential capacity to serve 350,000 children, according to DECAL.
In 2011, Deal proposed $54 million in cuts to pre-k, including increasing class sizes and cutting the program from full time to part time. He later decided cutting the school year would be better than shortening the school day.
After that move, the retention rate for the program’s lead teachers, traditionally those with the most experience, fell from 83.32 percent to 67.70 percent, according to state data.
To add back the first 10 days, Deal opted to forgo plans to open the program to an additional 2,000 students who are on waiting lists.
Georgia’s program, which serves about 84,000 4-year-olds, has been lauded as the first in the country to offer pre-k to all children regardless of income. In the latest report from the National Institute for Early Education Research, it was one of only five to meet all 10 national standards for quality.
The program’s rating is expected to fall from a 10 to an 8 in the next NIEER report due to the increase in class sizes approved in 2011.
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