Building on recent state efforts to strengthen early learning support, Delaware earned $5.5 million dollars last week from a federal Early Head Start grant opportunity to help support high quality, comprehensive services for infants and toddlers from low income families, over 5-years. This effort builds on recent investments in Delaware’s early learning system, including leveraging the Early Learning Challenge, investment at the state level, and strong commitments by many stakeholders.

The case for these investments is clear: almost 90% of brain development occurs before age five, and long term studies have found a range of $4-$9 in returns for every dollar invested in high-quality early learning programs for low-income children. We know learning begins at birth, and achievement gaps have been documented as early as nine months.

Through the Early Head Start grant more comprehensive services will be available for families who qualify for the federal Head Start early childhood program. Initial services, beginning in January 2015, will increase services for 72 children, providing opportunities for children in all three counties. Funding will support infants and toddlers in full day, year-round programs with comprehensive services that include health and developmental screening, expanded family engagement opportunities and health and nutrition services.

In addition to direct services for children, the grant will provide greater opportunities for professional development and site-based technical assistance for staff who work with infants and toddlers. This will build on the announcement Governor Markell made in February committing additional funding for high-quality programs serving the state’s youngest students, including additional resources to programs serving infants.

Delaware has made significant improvements in early learning over the last three years, and we are confident we can achieve even greater outcomes for children by leveraging these types of investments—especially as we continue to engage many partners to achieve this success.

The title of the annual Vision 2015 conference, “Education in The First State: Positioned to Lead,” aptly describes Delaware’s station nationally in the area of early learning.

As we come together annually to reflect on the state’s progress, we should all have a sense of optimism. When the Vision 2015 plan was first released, state leadership was in transition and funding had not been identified to support these recommendations (of which the early learning recommendations alone were estimated to cost $70M).  Today, we have stellar state leaders including Governor Jack Markell who heard from former-Pennsylvania Governor Ed Rendell that Delaware Office of Early Learning Director Harriet Dichter is “the closest thing to Superwoman he has seen.” Our state leaders have enabled additional state investments ($22M per year when most states were cutting services), which leveraged $50M federal resources for early learning when the state was awarded a Race to the Top – Early Learning Challenge (ELC) grant.

Six years ago, when the Vision 2015 plan was released, a coalition of stakeholders recommended improving (1) state support for high quality early learning programs; (2) professional development for staff; and (3) alignment among data systems, early learning and K-12 programs, and state agencies. Delaware has so much to celebrate: all of these major recommendations have been implemented to some degree and several have been far surpassed or enhanced in a relatively short time.

The panelists in the conference plenary panel were Harriet Dichter; Rena Hallam, Director of Delaware Stars and Associate Professor at the University of Delaware; Cheryl Clendaniel, Early Childhood Administrator at The Learning Center and member of the Provider’s Committee of the Delaware Early Childhood Council; and Superintendent Dan Curry of the Lake Forest School District. Each of the panelists are devoted to implementing the Early Learning Challenge and discussed a number of exciting initiatives are underway. Cheryl Clendaniel called the ELC plan the state’s “map” for success and noted her optimism about our progress, which includes:

• Greater levels of participation (338 programs participating today, from 178 only a year ago) and increased quality among Stars programs.
• Enhanced collaboration between early care providers and the K-12 system, which will be strengthened when Delaware Early Learning Teams are be launched in 2013 by community partners to help create linkages between early learning and K-12.
• Launch of the Early Learning Survey, which will provide a standard measurement for kindergarten readiness to equip kindergarten teachers with data on the overall knowledge and skills their students possess and inform the early childhood community on its strengths and deficits in preparing students for kindergarten. Superintendent Curry spoke to the leadership of kindergarten teachers in his district in implementing these efforts. He also spoke about the promise of the data for teacher collaboration, improved planning and instruction, and ongoing monitoring.

Stakeholders throughout the state including parents, early learning providers, health care providers, policymakers, nonprofit and community organizations, and the K-12 system are aligned and implementing strategies that will ensure our children enter kindergarten equipped to learn. Make no mistake, we have a long way to go: as Dichter noted, only 20% of early learning teachers have bachelor’s degrees, and most children are not in high-quality rated programs. We must stay the course to ensure we secure our position as national leaders in serving our youngest learners.

After an evening hearing on charter schools last Tuesday, the House Education Committee tackled HB 317, which will authorize a statewide Kindergarten readiness tool, and HB 273, which would require all high school students to take financial literacy coursework. Both were tabled for future discussion, and this week’s agenda also includes HB 211, requiring admission to vocational-technical high schools be determined through a lottery system only.

The state Kindergarten entry assessment is part of Delaware’s Race to the Top Early Learning Challenge plan, onto which the Kids’ Caucus (as well as many others) signed. Once approved by the legislature, it will be launched fall 2012 with 100 teachers and phased in statewide by 2015, with the purpose of informing teachers’ instruction and providing data for research and policymaking. It will cover five domains: language and literacy development; cognition and general knowledge; approaches toward learning; physical well-being and motor development; and social and emotional development. Legislators’ discussion and questions addressed issues including:

• how can the data appropriately be used to inform providers of child care that cared for children before Kindergarten, which is under development and will be supported by Kindergarten Readiness Teams of elementary school and child care personnel, as well as parents and community members;
• if there is any cost to the state, not until 2017, when the state’s bill will be about $87,000 per year, because the the Early Learning Challenge funds will cover the assessment and support needed;
• how we ensure the assessment doesn’t infringe on valuable instructional time that teachers have with students, which is being addressed by districts and teachers who will submit plans for implementation that will be supported by ELC funds.

The districts, DSEA, Vision 2015, and many other community partners are supportive of this initiative. Lake Forest Kindergarten Team Leader Chris Barrett said “Kindergarten teachers across the state are really excited about this. This will give us what we need to understand what to do for each child, and we appreciate the support being given to teachers.”

In early childhood news, HB 266 was released by the Sunset committee, which would remove exemptions from child care licensing for public and private programs, including programs operated by school districts and private schools, which have long been exempted. While public school programs operate under Delaware Department of Education regulations, their facilities are not always up to the standards for child care licensing because they weren’t built to serve children under the age of 5. And private schools have been able to skirt regulations as long as they serve students in 6^th grade or higher along with young children. While most believe that licensing are minimum standards that all child care providers should meet, there could be a large price tag for schools to bring their facilities up to code (think lower sinks, smaller toilets, fenced in playgrounds). The fiscal note has not been calculated but could be cause for reconsideration.

HB 273 (financial literacy requirement) joins several other bills that address the purview of the State Board of Education in terms of the standards schools are required to teach: HB 299, requiring CPR; SB 214 requiring 150 minutes of physical activity in elementary schools; and SB 191, requiring instruction in public schools on the history of organized labor in America and the collective bargaining process.

Although the proof will be in the results we deliver for our kids, praise for Delaware’s leadership in early learning and K-12 education reinforces we’re on the right path. And Sara Mead’s opinion in The News Journal on March 31 “Can Delaware deliver for its littlest learners?”, below, points to a number of strengths we can celebrate.

One of the most encouraging is the coherence of our developing P-20 system, including our approach to strengthening collaboration between early childhood providers, families, and schools to ensure Kindergarteners enter schools ready to learn. The Kindergarten Readiness teams proposal in the Race to the Top—Early Learning Challenge builds on lessons from schools throughout Delaware and initiatives including the Getting School Ready initiative in Washington state. It holds the promise of bringing traditionally disjointed systems together to build a common understanding of what it means to be “ready to learn”. The next steps are to select an organization to manage this process and identify the schools that will be invited to participate.

As Mead advocates, Delaware will have a survey of Kindergarteners (called a Kindergarten entry or readiness assessment) beginning this fall. We already have underway the research process to design the framework for this assessment. This framework will inform the selection of an outside organization that can offer comprehensive assessments that meet teachers’ needs. And a Committee has been formed, which includes representation from nine Kindergarten teachers, the DSEA, district leaders, and early childhood advocates. This group will ensure that the implementation of the assessment is all we intend: informative for teachers’ practice, useful for policymaking, and supportive in building a common understanding about what it means to be “ready”.

Delaware, as Mead points out, is ready to demonstrate that we can deliver.

 

Can Delaware deliver for its littlest learners?

Imagine if every Delaware child entered school ready to succeed, and if every third grader could read on grade-level. Delaware students have made impressive learning gains, but the state still falls short of these goals. Twenty-eight percent of Delaware 4^th graders lack basic reading skills. The state doesn’t track kindergarten readiness—a problem in itself—but national data show that many kindergarteners lack key skills, such as the ability to recognize letters or pay attention in class.  

Fortunately, Delaware has the power to change this. Delaware is one of only two states to win a federal Race to the Top grant, which supports public school reforms; an Early Learning Challenge Grant, to improve quality in early childhood programs; and a Maternal, Infant and Early Childhood Home Visiting Grant, which supports high-risk children and families starting before birth. These grants provide significant resources to improve early childhood and K-12 education in Delaware. They also acknowledge Delaware’s national leadership on both early childhood and public school reform.

Over the past decade, Delaware policymakers invested resources and political will to implement standards-based, data-driven school reform and promote young children’s learning and development. Delaware has created a state-of-art student data system, begun building a rigorous educator evaluation system, and adopted policies to turn around low-performing schools. It has adopted evidence-based early learning standards, invested in developing early educators, and created Delaware Stars for Early Success to improve childcare quality and help parents make informed choices. While other states have cut early childhood spending in recent years, Delaware increased investment by $22 million to improve quality—and brought in another $49 million in new federal funds.

Now Delaware has the unique opportunity to combine its early childhood and public school reforms to yield even greater benefits for children. Abundant research shows that children’s—particularly poor children’s—changes of success are greatest when they have rich early childhood experiences followed by high-quality public schools. But, in my work studying early childhood and school reforms across the country, I’ve seen that this is all too rare. “P-20 alignment” has become a buzzword in education—38 states have established councils to coordinate early childhood, K-12, and higher education systems. But these initiatives rarely create truly seamless experiences for students. Having demonstrated national leadership on K-12 reform and early childhood, Delaware now must show the nation what can happen when a state truly integrates the two.

The first step is providing all children with a seamless, high-quality Prek-3rd early learning experience, to ensure that all students read on grade level and have strong social and math skills by 3^rd grade—a critical turning point that predicts children’s later school and life success. Delaware is creating the necessary components of PreK-3rd—support for high-risk families from birth, expanded access to quality childcare and preschool, and improved elementary instruction. Now the state needs to bridge the gap between disparate early childhood and elementary systems. To help do this, Delaware is creating “Readiness Teams” of principals, teachers, preschools, and partners in high-need communities. But more is needed to get early childhood programs, elementary schools, and parents in all communities to really work together.

Delaware also desperately needs a kindergarten entry assessment, and the state has assembled a committee to begin working on this in the fall—a pivotal development for   a number of reasons. First, kKindergarten entry assessments provide a picture of what incoming kindergarteners can do, so their teachers can design instruction that builds on children’s strengths. And while these assessments never have consequences for individual children or teachers, the data they generate about local and statewide trends, strengths, and weaknesses can inform policy and help target state resources to improve school readiness. As Delaware moves to adopt Common Core Standards in grades K-12, kindergarten entry assessments are particularly important to create common expectations for what all preschoolers—whether in pre-k, childcare, or at home—should learn to be ready to meet Common Core standards.

Finally, Delaware must foster entrepreneurial problem-solving across the P-20 continuum. Delaware has made incredible progress in the past decade largely by implementing strong statewide systems for both K-12 and early childhood education. But maintaining its role as a national education leader will require the kind of innovation best driven by creative individuals working in schools, community-based early childhood organizations, and as social entrepreneurs. Delaware must identify ways to encourage and support high-quality innovation in all these settings.

Delaware’s Race to the Top and Early Learning Challenge wins show that the state is a national leader on early childhood and K-12 school reform. Now Delaware must show the nation the benefits that a truly aligned P-20 education system can yield for children.

Sara Mead is an associate partner with Bellwether Education Partners.