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In January 2005, Gov. Jeb Bush signed into law the Voluntary Prekindergarten Program (VPK), enacted by the Florida legislature to implement a constitutional amendment requiring a state-funded pre-kindergarten program. Florida voters approved the pre-k program in 2002 through a ballot referendum amending the Florida Constitution. As such, preschool education in Florida is a constitutionally protected right, on par with the right to public education.
The constitutional amendment is precise: "[e]very four-year old child shall be provided by the State a high quality pre-kindergarten learning opportunity … delivered according to professionally accepted standards." The VPK program violates this directive, first, by not ensuring that every four-year-old child is offered a program. Public schools can participate in VPK during the school year only if they first meet the class size reduction requirements in the Florida constitution, a big challenge for many overcrowded districts. School districts are required to admit preschoolers in the pre-k program only during the summer months, when many families are not engaged with the school system or may find it difficult to send their children to school.
To its credit, the VPK program relies heavily on private preschools and childcare centers to deliver needed programs. However, participation by providers is voluntary, and with projected funding of only $2,500 per student, it is unlikely enough will participate, especially since the cost of a high quality program exceeds the per-pupil allotment. The VPK program also does not fund transportation, a barrier to participation for rural children. Moreover, providers funded under VPK are free to choose which children to admit, and can discriminate based on religion. This may turn out to be quite common since churches in Florida now run many private preschools and childcare centers.
While the public schools must accept every child who meets residency and age requirements, providers in the VPK program can reject preschoolers for any reason at all, including socioeconomic status and ability. There is even a built-in incentive for providers to reject students who appear least likely to succeed, since each VPK program will be rated based on student performance on a kindergarten readiness assessment.
Second, the VPK program falls short of the constitutional mandate for high quality programs. As the ballot initiative made clear, "high quality pre-kindergarten" must be "delivered according to professionally accepted standards," including a "core curriculum," and "appropriate staffing ratios, teacher qualifications and professional development." These quality standards are consistent with the research on early childhood education.
The State of Preschool: 2004 State Preschool Yearbook, by the National Institute for Early Education Research (NIEER) rates each state’s preschool program according to a research-based checklist of quality benchmarks. When the doors open for the VPK program next school year, the program will meet only two out of ten of NIEER’s quality indicators – staff-child ratio and class size limit. The program fails on the other critical benchmarks, including curriculum standards and qualified teachers. On teacher qualifications, VPK misses the mark on what experts agree are the keys to quality - teachers with a bachelor’s degree and specialized training, assistant teachers with a child development associate credential, and on-going professional development. VPK does not require these credentials and training, and lacks any plan to move Florida’s prekindergarten workforce in this direction.
The VPK program also faces potential challenge under the no-aid provision in the Florida Constitution. This provision in the clause against the establishment of religion mandates that "[n]o revenue of the state ... shall ever be taken from the public treasury directly or indirectly in aid ... of any sectarian institution." The VPK program depends in large part on private, church-based programs to serve Florida’s preschoolers. In the recent decision Bush v. Holmes, 886 So.2d 340 (2004), the Florida Court of Appeals ruled that the state school voucher program, through which state-funded vouchers are given to parents to pay tuition at private schools, including sectarian and church-based schools, violates the no-aid provision. The Court found that any disbursement made under the voucher program and paid to a sectarian or religious school is made in aid of a "sectarian institution," within the scope of the no-aid provision of the anti-establishment clause, namely, the school itself, even if it is shown that no voucher funds directly benefit or support a church or religious denomination. The voucher case is likely to go before the Florida Supreme Court and may bear on the constitutionality of the VPK program under the no-aid provision.
Prepared: February 1, 2005
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