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How Are We Doing Toward That Goal?

NNPA NEWSWIRE — NIEER just released its 2023 State of Preschool Yearbook, which annually tracks state-funded preschool enrollment, funding, and quality across states. This year’s report shows that during the 2022-2023 school year states enrolled over 1.63 million children in preschool, marking a 7% surge compared to the preceding year.
The post How Are We Doing Toward That Goal? first appeared on BlackPressUSA.

Published

11 months ago

April 22, 2024

Oakland Post

Editor’s note: The following is the second in a series of columns devoted to early childhood education and its role, value and importance to young children, families and all communities.

W. Steven Barnett, Ph.D., senior co-director, and founder, National Institute for Early Education Research

Despite strides in preschool enrollment across the country, access to quality early education remains inequitable and heavily skewed by geography, according to our new National Institute for Early Education Research (NIEER) analysis. State-by-state disparities in preschool access, quality, and funding are widening each year as some states take leaps forward while others still do not have a program. How each state chooses to move forward—and whether the federal government helps—will determine how much real progress is made in helping America’s three- and four-year-olds access quality preschool.

NIEER just released its 2023 State of Preschool Yearbook, which annually tracks state-funded preschool enrollment, funding, and quality across states. This year’s report shows that during the 2022-2023 school year states enrolled over 1.63 million children in preschool, marking a 7% surge compared to the preceding year. Preschool enrollment reached 35% of four-year-olds and 7% of three-year-olds, with state expenditures reaching $11.73 billion, an 11% increase from 2021-2022 when adjusted for inflation.

Despite progress, most states still need to catch up to their pre-pandemic level of preschool enrollment. We believe the research is crystal clear that children who attend high-quality preschools are better prepared when they enter kindergarten, laying a foundation for later success. However, programs must be high quality to deliver those results, and in 2024, states are more uneven than ever in their preschool funding and quality standards.

Every family should have the opportunity to enroll their three- and four-year-olds in a quality pre-k program, no matter where they live or their economic situation. We encourage state and federal leaders to help families gain access to high-quality, full day, adequately funded early learning opportunities that will help children develop and parents earn a living. Our new report finds that state-funded preschool programs have bounced back unevenly from the COVID-19 Pandemic. A record number of 16 states plus the District of Columbia are now committed to universal preschool, yet most of those states are far from reaching that goal. A key question for the future is whether states will increase investments enough to keep promises regarding program expansion and quality, including adequate pay for the workforce.

Across states, spending ranges from more than $16,000 per child to barely $2,000 per child. Only five states met all ten research-based minimum quality benchmarks recommended by NIEER (Alabama, Hawaii, Michigan, Mississippi, and Rhode Island). More than twice as many children attend preschool programs meeting fewer than half of NIEER’s quality standards benchmarks than programs meeting nine or 10. Legislators in several states are currently considering pre-k funding increases for the next fiscal year, including major proposals in Massachusetts and Michigan and a New Hampshire bill that would create a state-funded preschool program in that state.

Last month, Georgia state lawmakers approved a nearly $100 million package to make critical quality improvements while expanding the state’s lottery-funded pre-k program, including salary parity for pre-k lead and assistant teachers with K-12; capping class size at 20 children; and increasing classroom start-up grants. Our new report calls on the federal government to offer states financial incentives to support high-quality preschool education. Over the last 21 years, NIEER’s State of Preschool publications have found that red and blue states alike are increasingly prioritizing preschool yet struggling to pay for it. Given the long-term return on investment of quality preschool, helping states pay for quality preschool expansion should be an area of bipartisan consensus in Congress.

NIEER estimates an additional $30 billion could allow states to provide a quality full school-day preschool program to all four-year-olds. If the federal government increased support for preschool education to the states by just $1.5 billion per year over the next ten years, the federal government would cover half that cost in 10 years. “With the pandemic in the rearview, it’s time for state and federal leaders to choose whether and how they are going to support high-quality preschool,” said Allison Friedman-Krauss, Ph.D., the report’s lead author. “Will this be the turning point needed for the country to make real progress towards high-quality universal preschool? Will programs serve both three- and four-year-olds? Will investments be enough to ensure that programs are effective? Will states support an equitable mixed-delivery model for preschool incorporating both existing childcare programs and public schools? How will states recruit, support, and retain preschool teachers? These decisions will impact millions of children for years to come.”

W. Steven Barnett, Ph.D., is the senior co-director and founder of the National Institute for Early Education Research (www.nieer.org). His work primarily focuses on public policies regarding early childhood education, childcare, and child development. Barnett earned his Ph.D. in economics at the University of Michigan and has authored or co-authored more than 300 publications. 

The post How Are We Doing Toward That Goal? first appeared on BlackPressUSA.

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Fighting to Keep Blackness

BlackPressUSA NEWSWIRE — Trump supporters have introduced another bill to take down the bright yellow letters of Black Lives Matter Plaza in Washington, D.C., in exchange for the name Liberty Plaza. D.C.

Published

2 weeks ago

March 7, 2025

Oakland Post

By April Ryan

As this nation observes the 60th anniversary of Bloody Sunday in Selma, Alabama, the words of President Trump reverberate. “This country will be WOKE no longer”, an emboldened Trump offered during his speech to a joint session of Congress Tuesday night. Since then, Alabama Congresswoman Terri Sewell posted on the social media platform formerly known as Twitter this morning that “Elon Musk and his DOGE bros have ordered GSA to sell off the site of the historic Freedom Riders Museum in Montgomery.” Her post of little words went on to say, “This is outrageous and we will not let it stand! I am demanding an immediate reversal. Our civil rights history is not for sale!” DOGE trying to sell Freedom Rider Museum

Also, in the news today, the Associated Press is reporting they have a file of names and descriptions of more than 26,000 military images flagged for removal because of connections to women, minorities, culture, or DEI. In more attempts to downplay Blackness, a word that is interchanged with woke, Trump supporters have introduced another bill to take down the bright yellow letters of Black Lives Matter Plaza in Washington, D.C., in exchange for the name Liberty Plaza. D.C. Mayor Morial Bowser is allowing the name change to keep millions of federal dollars flowing there. Black Lives Matter Plaza was named in 2020 after a tense exchange between President Trump and George Floyd protesters in front of the White House. There are more reports about cuts to equity initiatives that impact HBCU students. Programs that recruited top HBCU students into the military and the pipeline for Department of Defense contracts have been canceled.

Meanwhile, Democrats are pushing back against this second-term Trump administration’s anti-DEI and Anti-woke message. In the wake of the 60th anniversary of Bloody Sunday in Selma, several Congressional Black Caucus leaders are reintroducing the Voting Rights Act. South Carolina Democratic Congressman James Clyburn and Alabama Congresswoman Terry Sewell are sponsoring H.R. 14, the John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act. Six decades ago, Lewis was hit with a billy club by police as he marched for the right to vote for African Americans. The right for Black people to vote became law with the 1965 Voting Rights Act that has since been gutted, leaving the nation to vote without the full protections of the Voting Rights Act. Reflecting on the late Congressman Lewis, March 1, 2020, a few months before his death, Lewis said, “We need more than ever in these times many more someones to make good trouble- to make their own dent in the wall of injustice.”

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Rep. Al Green is Censured by The U.S. House After Protesting Trump on Medicaid

BLACKPRESSUSA NEWSWIRE — His censure featured no hearing at the House Ethics Committee and his punishment was put on the floor for a vote by the Republican controlled House less than 72 hours after the infraction in question.

Published

2 weeks ago

March 6, 2025

Oakland Post

By Lauren Burke

In one of the quickest punishments of a member of the U.S. House of Representatives in the modern era, Congressman Al Green (D-TX) was censured by a 224-198 vote today in the House. His censure featured no hearing at the House Ethics Committee and his punishment was put on the floor for a vote by the Republican controlled House less than 72 hours after the infraction in question. Of the last three censures of members of the U.S. House, two have been members of the Congressional Black Caucus under GOP control. In 2023, Rep. Jamal Bowman was censured.

On the night of March 4, as President Trump delivered a Joint Address to Congress, Rep. Green interrupted him twice. Rep. Green shouted, “You don’t have a mandate to cut Medicare, and you need to raise the cap on social security,” to President Trump. In another rare event, Rep. Green was escorted off the House floor by security shortly after yelling at the President by order of GOP House Speaker Mike Johnson. Over the last four years, members of Congress have yelled at President Biden during the State of the Union. Georgia Republican Marjorie Taylor-Greene was joined by Republican Rep. Lauren Bobert (R-CO) in 2022 in yelling at President Biden. In 2023, Rep. Greene, Rep. Bob Good (R-VA), and Rep. Lisa McClain (R-MI) yelled at Biden, interrupting his speech. In 2024, wearing a red MAGA hat, a violation of the rules of the U.S. House, Greene interrupted Biden again. She was never censured for her behavior. Rep. Green voted “present” on his censure and was joined by freshman Democrat Congressman Shomari Figures of Alabama who also voted “present”.

All other members of the Congressional Black Caucus voted against censuring Green. Republicans hold a four-seat advantage in the U.S. House after the death of Texas Democrat and former Houston Mayor Sylvester Turner yesterday. Ten Democrats voted along with Republicans to censure Rep. Green, including Rep. Jim Himes of Connecticut, who is in the leadership as the senior Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee. “I respect them but, I would do it again,” and “it is a matter of conscience,” Rep. Green told Black Press USA’s April Ryan in an exclusive interview on March 5. After the vote, a group of Democrats sang “We Shall Overcome” in the well at the front of the House chamber. Several Republican members attempted to shout down the singing. House Speaker Mike Johnson gaveled the House out of session and into a recess. During the brief recess members moved back to their seats and out of the well of the House. Shortly after the vote to censor Rep. Green, Republican Congressman Andy Ogles of Tennessee quickly filed legislation to punish members who participated in the singing of “We Shall Overcome.” Earlier this year, Rep. Ogles filed legislation to allow President Donald Trump to serve a third term, which is currently unconstitutional. As the debate started, the stock market dove down over one-point hours from close. The jobs report will be made public tomorrow.

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Trump Moves to Dismantle Education Department

BLACKPRESSUSA NEWSWIRE — The department oversees programs under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA), serving 7.5 million students. Transferring IDEA oversight to another agency, as Trump’s plan suggests, could jeopardize services and protections for disabled students.

Published

2 weeks ago

March 6, 2025

Stacy M. Brown

By Stacy M. Brown
BlackPressUSA.com Senior National Correspondent
@StacyBrownMedia

The Trump administration is preparing to issue an executive order directing newly confirmed Education Secretary Linda McMahon to begin dismantling the Department of Education. While the president lacks the authority to unilaterally shut down the agency—requiring congressional approval—McMahon has been tasked with taking “all necessary steps” to reduce its role “to the maximum extent permitted by law.” The administration justifies the move by claiming the department has spent over $1 trillion since its 1979 founding without improving student achievement. However, data from The Nation’s Report Card shows math scores have improved significantly since the 1990s, though reading levels have remained stagnant. The pandemic further widened achievement gaps, leaving many students behind.

The Education Department provides about 10% of public-school funding, primarily targeting low-income students, rural districts, and children with disabilities. A recent Data for Progress poll found that 61% of voters oppose Trump’s efforts to abolish the agency, while just 34% support it. In Washington, D.C., where student proficiency rates remain low—22% in math and 34% in English—federal funding is crucial. Serenity Brooker, an elementary education major, warned that cutting the department would worsen conditions in underfunded schools.

“D.C. testing scores aren’t very high right now, so cutting the Department of Education isn’t going to help that at all,” she told Hilltop News. A report from the Education Trust found that low-income schools in D.C. receive $2,200 less per student than wealthier districts, leading to shortages in essential classroom materials. The department oversees programs under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA), serving 7.5 million students. Transferring IDEA oversight to another agency, as Trump’s plan suggests, could jeopardize services and protections for disabled students.

The Office for Civil Rights also plays a key role in enforcing laws that protect students from discrimination. Moving it to the Department of Justice, as proposed in Project 2025, would make it harder for families to file complaints, leaving vulnerable students with fewer protections. Federal student aid programs, including Pell Grants and loan repayment plans, could face disruption if the department is dismantled. Experts warn this could worsen the student debt crisis, pushing more borrowers into default. “With funding cuts, they don’t have the materials they need, like books or things to help with math,” Brooker said. “It makes learning less fun for them.”