Early Ed Watch

Paul Tough, whose blog on education is rapidly becoming one of our favorites, writes about some of the challenges facing New Haven's Amistad High School. Amistad is part of the Achievement First network of high-performing charter schools and opened two years ago to serve students coming out of Amistad Academy middle school.

A new report from the Center for Education Policy looks at how 5 states are dealing with NCLB's requirements to "restructure" chronically low-performing schools. Under NCLB, schools that fail to make adequate yearly progress for at least five consecutive years are subject to restructuring.

A new report from Pre-K Now gauges state legislative support for quality pre-k during the 2008 state legislative sessions. This report is one of two the organization does annually; the other is an annual barometer of governors’ leadership on pre-k through state funding requests.

Generally, the news is looking good: Despite the economic downturn, state legislatures in twenty-three states and the District of Columbia Council increased pre-k funding for fiscal year 2009. Nine more states that don’t appropriate money directly for pre-k but fund pre-k through school funding formulas also project an increase. At the same time, eight states maintained pre-k funding at fiscal year 2008 levels, two decreased funding for pre-k, and twelve states don’t invest in public pre-k at all. Overall, however, net state investments in pre-k for 2009 will increase by $309 million--or roughly 6 percent--to $5.2 billion.

A few weeks ago I traveled to Arkansas, where I had an opportunity to learn more about the state's early education system and meet some of the people who play a critical role in implementing, overseeing, and supporting pre-k programs in Arkansas.