Sunday, August 26, 2012

San Antonio Mayor seeks to supplement Pre-K funding

While Laredo's politicians reason to raise our sales tax by a quarter cent was to built the oft-empty Arena and Lemur stadium, San Antonio has a better idea of what to do with the quarter penny sales tax increase. Of course, not everyone agrees with Mayor Julian Castro's idea to help fund Pre-K on a full day basis. 

Locally, some bloggers such as Tom Wade have gone on the record as opposing full-day Pre-Ks. If I remember correctly, Wade has referred to them as all-day day care centers - or something to that effect. What say you Tom Wade?

Anyway, here's an excerpt from the Texas Tribune on the San Antonio story

An initiative from San Antonio Mayor Julián Castro that would direct a portion of sales tax revenue to fund full-day pre-kindergarten unanimously passed the City Council, leaving it for voters to approve in November.
 
The pre-K funding initiative, which has the support of the education community and prominent business leaders in the city like Charles Butt of H-E-B and Joe Robles of USAA, is a major policy proposal for the San Antonio mayor, who was thrust into the national spotlight last week when he was chosen to keynote this year’s Democratic National Convention on Sept. 4.
 
The state currently covers half-day pre-K for children from low-income, English-language-learning, military and foster families. Many districts opt to offer a full-day program, which they did with the help of additional state grants before the Legislature in 2011 slashed more than $200 million allocated for that purpose.
 
Districts have tried various methods, including charging tuition, to keep full-day pre-K programs alive since the state funding was eliminated. But San Antonio's is the first such effort initiated at the city level.

10 comments:

  1. This comment has been removed by the author.

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    1. Sorry, I had to change a paragraph....see below.

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  2. Max, I still stand by my comments about day care. Going all the way back to the start of Head Start, which was billed as a pre-school learning initative.

    I would imagine in some cases there is an advantage of getting the kids away from their parents. But the reality is this, as is stated in many studies, while a 4 year old who has attended pre-school kindergarten may have a slight advantage over others their age, that by the third grade all advantages are gone.

    Now, I am not totally opposed to having the service for the poor or certain selected groups, I am opposed to trying to make it a 100% program as some wish.

    I would rather work on getting people out of poverty by creating jobs than providing a government subsidized baby sitting service for 4 year olds.

    But hey, that is just me.

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  3. I'm a child of Head Start. I'm all for it. I'm sure it helped my mom out a lot.

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  4. On top of that we could provide free food, free housing subsidies, free transportation services, free medical care, clothing allowances and what the heck why not a little extra so parents can go out on the weekend. Oh wait we already do that. Wait a minute did I just agree with Wade?

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  5. ONLY QUALIFIED applicants will be considered.

    This program is NOT for people who work a full time job. In other words...you are getting up to work every morning to pay for PreK for other people because YOUR own children would not qualify.

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  6. Thanks for the comments. Hey Tom Wade, were you the most conservative kid in your pre-K class. Wait a minute- did they have school back then yet? OK Just Kidding. I know they had to have had log cabins at least.
    LT

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  7. Yes, we had kindergarten when I was a kid. If my mom tells the story correctly, I did not want to stay that first day. She says I threw a fit...who me? Throw a fit...more likely my first rant.

    Anyway, I was raised very conservative. I grew up in the 50's and early 60's with two working parents (kind of unusual then). I spent many years with a babysitter when my parents were working, and Head Start had not started. We most likely would not have been accepted as both my parents worked and made a middle class income (father highway construction (union job, he taught me about union influence) and my mom was a bookkeeper for a small business owner.

    And I was raised in Kansas City, Missouri....so yes, pretty conservative.

    Was I most conservative, nope, not at all.

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  8. What does strike me as bothering is the fact that we no longer want to let kids be kids. This is a topic for future discussion. Our kids are not allowed to "imagine," as we do that for them with video games and the internet. Some want to let the public school system structure their learning at age 3 or earlier...that is scary.

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  9. Yes Tom Wade, a lot of the younger kids/teenagers/young adults are a little bit too involved with their digital technology devices. I've noticed many young adults lack the courtesy and conversational skills that used to be more commonplace. Am I skewing my perception because I am not that much into the digital age- maybe. That's my take anywya.

    LaredoTejas

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