The importance of early childhood education

Mariah Zumo’s heart breaks a little every time her 4-year-old twins ask why they can’t attend preschool.
The Sioux City woman and her husband earn too much money for the boys to qualify for Head Start, the federal early education program that serves low-income families and helped prepare their 6-year-old son, Eban, for kindergarten.
The twins won’t be old enough for Iowa’s Statewide Voluntary Preschool Program until fall. Until then, finding an affordable private school for Tristan and Trendan has proven difficult. For now, the boys spend their days at home with Mariah. Their father, Marshall, is an air base security officer for the state and serves in the Army Reserves.


Preschool is “a stepping stone to school,” Zumo said. “I wish our finances were at the point where we could give that to them.”

Learning in the early years is critical to a child’s lifelong development. The neurological pathways children will later use for everything from coloring to calculus are constructed within the first few years, according to brain research conducted over the past decade.

Iowa has greatly expanded early childhood education opportunities in recent years, placing the state seventh in the nation in preschool access. Yet a host of factors — including district-imposed limits on the size of the state preschool program — meant about a third of Iowa’s 4-year-olds did not attend preschool last year, census estimates show.

These missed opportunities for early learning can haunt children through life, stunting their success in school and the workplace and limiting Iowa’s economic vitality, experts say.

“Early childhood education — that’s where the future of our state lies. In stark economic terms, you get more bang for your buck,” said Betty Zan, director of the regents’ Center for Early Developmental Education at the University of Northern Iowa in Cedar Falls. “On the human side, it’s just the right thing to do. If kids are struggling when they are younger, they are going to continue to struggle when they are older.”

Enrichment through preschool is particularly important for children from low-income families, experts say.

The state’s childhood poverty rate is now climbing faster than the national average. That’s among the unprecedented challenges facing this generation of Iowa children, the subject of a yearlong Des Moines Register special project.

Nearly 20 percent of Iowa kids ages 5 and younger lived in poverty in 2011. The percentage more than doubles when considering the income families need to cover basic necessities, such as food and child care. That’s often measured at 200 percent of the federal poverty level, or under $46,042 for a family of four.

Last year, 44 percent of Iowa’s children ages 5 and younger, or 105,759 kids, lived below that line.

The state’s climbing child poverty rate and its growing non-English-speaking population signal a need to invest more in school readiness programs, said Shanell Wagler of Early Childhood Iowa.

Nationally, fewer than half of all poor children are ready for school at age 5, compared to 75 percent of children from families with moderate and high incomes, according to a 2012 study by the Brookings Institute of Washington, D.C.

“We need to be thinking about how to provide quality learning environments from birth on,” Wagler said. “If we can do that, we’ll have more children being successful in school. We’ll become more competitive. ”

While Iowa ranks high among states in preschool access, the United States lags other developed nations in investment in early childhood services. Giving kids in Iowa and the rest of America the best start would require overhauling education priorities and funding, child development advocates say.

“Research tells us that the most critical time for a child’s brain development is in those first three years,” said Kate Bennett, a community impact officer with the United Way of Central Iowa. “But that’s also when the public investment is lowest, and we know if kids start behind, they generally stay behind.”

For early education, little help for parents

Education gaps between children of low-income and more affluent families start from the beginning, in the home.

A landmark 1995 study found that poor children are exposed to 30 million fewer words by age 3 than children from more affluent families. Other studies have shown that achievement gaps can appear as early as 18 months for children at risk of learning delays, such as those from low-income families.

“At times parents, especially our families in poverty, are under so much stress already that (early childhood education) is not their top priority,” said Susan Guest, director of early childhood programs for Des Moines Public Schools. “Keeping food on the table and a roof over their head, that’s their top priority.”

Educational experts recognize parents as a child’s first, best teachers. Yet most moms and dads in Iowa are more or less on their own when it comes to providing age-appropriate early education.

Formal programs to instruct parents to be better teachers reach relatively few families. For example, home visit programs supported by Early Childhood Iowa served just 7.9 percent of the state’s children up to age 5 in 2011.

Although the brain doubles in size during a child’s first year and nears its adult volume by age 3, relatively few public or private education programs accommodate infants and toddlers, noted Barbara Merrill, executive director of the Iowa Association for the Education of Young Children.

“It’s always been understood that education in the K-12 world is a public responsibility,” Merrill said. “That’s not yet the case for birth to 5.”

The few preschool slots available for 18-month-old children in Iowa are hotly contested, parents say.

Meanwhile, the popularity of public library story hours, Kindermusik classes and community play groups shows families of all income levels want academic enrichment for their children.

Betsy Sarcone, a West Des Moines Realtor, arranges her schedule so she can work and still be her children’s primary caregiver.

She and her husband, Nick, an attorney, have constantly talked, read and played with their eldest daughter, Lydia, who turns 3 in January. Thanks in part to that continuous stimulation, Lydia could recite the alphabet at 20 months.

The girl joined a preschool program shortly after, and her vocabulary “just took off,” Nick Sarcone recalled.

The couple’s other child, Bianca, 1, is signed up to join the same program next fall.

Middle- and upper-class parents often have the means to cobble together appropriate home and community learning activities, Merrill said.

“It’s still a challenge, but they find ways to do it,” she said.

That’s not as often the case with Iowa’s lower-income families.

Iowa has income gaps in preschool attendance

Children from low-income families benefit most from early education programs, state and national research has shown. Yet those children are less likely than their peers from higher-income families to attend preschool in Iowa, according to U.S. census data.

In 2011, 79 percent of 4-year-olds from affluent families in Iowa (defined as those with income above $92,084 for a family of four) took part in an early education program. But only 66 percent of children living in families with incomes below the poverty line (earning less than $23,021 for a family of four) participated.

The participation rate was lowest among middle-income families who earned too much to qualify for government-subsidized programs including Head Start. Just 51 percent of children in Iowa families earning 200 percent to 299 percent of the federal poverty level were enrolled in preschool. For a family of four in 2011, that meant an income of $46,042 to $68,833.

Head Start aims to even the playing field by catering to children living at or just above the poverty line. In 2011, roughly 9,680 Iowa kids up to age 5 participated in the organization’s home visits, often offered weekly, or half-day or full-day preschool programs.

Demand outpaces supply, however, leading to long waiting lists.

Less than half (45.9 percent) of 3- and 4-year-olds from Iowa households at or below the poverty level were served by Head Start programs last year, said Tom Rendon, an Iowa Department of Education consultant who runs the Iowa Head Start State Collaboration Office.

Crystal Foote’s 3-year-old daughter, Novella, was accepted into a Des Moines Head Start preschool class this fall.

Novella struggles with language development. Foote, a stay-at-home mom, has benefited from parenting classes offered at her daughter’s school. The classes, she says, have taught her new ways to help Novella and her brother, 2-year-old Karl, prepare for school.

A family scrapbook includes pictures of the storybooks the trio read together. Novella’s favorite?

“Miss Mary Mack,” shouts the toddler, pointing to a photo of the book pasted inside the album. The first page of the story encourages kids to clap their hands along with the book’s rhyme.

“I just want her to be ready” for school, Foote said.

Not all kids get access to state preschool program

Legislators created Iowa’s Statewide Voluntary Preschool Program in 2007. Its goal is to expand access to high-quality preschool for all 4-year-olds to help ensure that participants enter school ready to learn.

Early research on the program shows positive trends. Kindergarten students in 2011-12 who had attended the program were less likely to need additional academic supports to meet literacy standards, according to a report by the state’s Department of Education.

But teachers can’t help the students they don’t see. Although participation has grown steadily, admission is limited based on classroom space.

Under state law, school districts can choose the number of preschool students they want to serve. Depending on the district, competition for slots can be fierce.

Tom DeWaay of Clive camped outside the Waukee school district’s administration building last December on the night before preschool registration. Braving the elements paid off. His daughter, Alexis, secured one of only 35 tuition-free slots available in the state’s 11th-largest school district.

Tara Sienkiewicz of Altoona wasn’t as lucky.

Her 4-year-old was placed on a waiting list for her district’s preschool. The girl now attends a church-based program in another town, at a cost of $125 a month, and spends the rest of the day with her grandmother.

Sienkiewicz had briefly considered having her daughter sit the year out.

“But she was ready,” Sienkiewicz said. “She knew her alphabet. She already knew all the things that me and my mom could really teach her.”

For families living on the edge, being wait-listed can alter a child’s educational trajectory, said UNI’s Zan.

“Not all children in Iowa have access to high-quality preschool experiences, and the preschool experiences that are available to children in Iowa don’t fit the needs of all the families in Iowa,” she said.

Champions of the state preschool program had envisioned its reach would expand more rapidly. Former Gov. Chet Culver promised in 2009 that “every 4-year-old whose family chooses” would have access to free instruction by 2011-12.

In that year, 23,696 of Iowa’s 40,205 4-year-olds, or 58.9 percent, were served by the state program. Iowa invested $58 million in preschool that year, and some students were funded through other sources. If every 4-year-old would have been served, the state’s preschool price tag would have been more than $120 million.

Legislators based funding on the estimated number of children whose parents would want them to attend preschool, said Senate Majority Leader Mike Gronstal, a Council Bluffs Democrat. Some parents simply want to keep their children home. Others prefer preschools not affiliated with the state program.

Districts applied for preschool grants during the program’s first five years. Starting in 2011-12, the school aid formula included funding for each preschooler at half the rate of a K-12 student, or about $3,000 for each 4-year-old.

Under current law, if districts were required to serve every 4-year-old, “they would have to cut what they spend on other parts of education,” Gronstal acknowledged.

Legislators last discussed the program in 2011, when Republicans attempted to scrap offering the program for free in exchange for a system where families would have been charged tuition on a sliding scale based on income.

Democrats won their fight to preserve the program. Gronstal said some members of his party favor increasing funding for preschool or for education programs aimed at the state’s 0 to 3 population.

“I certainly think there are lots of people in the Legislature that are interested in hearing where the shortfalls are, and how much access is being denied,” he said.

Beyond limits on available slots, some families can’t overcome challenges in arranging for transportation and for child care before and after preschool.

The state program requires only 10 hours of weekly instruction, which poses logistical hurdles for working parents. Iowa ranks first in the nation, at 75.6 percent, in the rate of children under age 6 with their single parent or both parents in the labor force.

Melissa Reisinger, a home day-care provider in Norwalk, pays a teacher at her daughter’s private preschool to drive her child to and from class.

But Burmese immigrant Pol Ta didn’t enroll her 4-year-old son, Samuel Kyi, in public preschool in Des Moines because of transportation issues.

“It’s difficult to do the juggling. Instead, parents say: ‘Well, I’ll just let my next-door neighbor watch my child,’ ” Zan said. “In Iowa, a lot of family, friends and neighbors care for children, and those children definitely don’t get the benefits of a preschool experience.”

Mother hopes her twins get access next year

Mariah Zumo, 32, plans to apply for Head Start for Tristan and Trendan again next fall, but they will likely remain ineligible because the family’s income is just above the poverty line.

The boys will be old enough next year to qualify for the Statewide Voluntary Preschool Program, but she’s uncertain whether the family could afford for them to participate.

The Sioux City school district operates its program as a public-private partnership. Although the state funds 10 hours of instruction each week, many providers incorporate the programming into existing full-day services, meaning parents still must pay some tuition.

The twins enter kindergarten in 2014-15, but Zumo knows the boys need to start working now to be ready.

Trendan could use some help building his speech skills. Both boys would benefit from learning how to play and share with other children, Zumo said.

This winter, she plans to help the twins learn to write the letters of the alphabet.

“They still ask me: Where’s my backpack? Why can’t we go to school?” Zumo said.

Next fall, she hopes to be able to give them a different answer.