Norton Introduces Public School Prekindergarten Bill to Fill Critical Gap in No Child Left Behind Law

Norton Introduces Public School Prekindergarten Bill to Fill Critical Gap in No Child Left Behind Law

November 17,2011

WASHINGTON, DC – Congresswoman Eleanor Holmes Norton (D-DC) today introduced the Universal Prekindergarten and Early Childhood Education Act of 2011 to use seed grants to encourage public school systems to provide universal, prekindergarten to every child, regardless of income. Norton's bill comes as the Obama administration is seeking to raise standards for Head Start following a study that revealed children lose the program's effects by the first grade. Norton wants her bill included in the reauthorization of the No Child Left Behind Act, which she says misses the most fertile years of brain development and early learning by leaving out prekindergarten.

The bill would bring the educational benefits of Pre-K within reach of the great majority of kids, for whom such programs are not available, by adding new grades for 3- and 4-year-olds, similar to 5-year-old kindergarten programs that are now routinely part of public schools. Providing Pre-K as part of the public school system would also ensure qualified teachers and safe facilities for all children. Norton's bill addresses the great uncertainty of parents who are neither wealthy enough to afford early education nor poor enough to qualify for Head Start. It also would leave intact proven programs funded by the federal government.

"The most reliable data from brain science conclusively demonstrate that the serious education of children must include the early preschool years," Norton said. "The needs of low-income kids were the first to come to congressional attention. The doors must now be opened for all kids during the most fertile brain development years of childhood."

The Congresswoman said that, especially now, when middle-class Americans, along with single mothers and low-income parents, are facing job loss, foreclosures, and rising healthcare costs, the federal government must plant the seeds for early childhood education, which have proven life-long benefits.Traditionally, early learning programs only have been available at either end of the income spectrum - to the affluent and to low-income families. The bill provides a practical way to gradually move to universal preschool throughout the country.