A child's early years - from prenatal to age 5 - are the most critical for human development. Building a strong foundation early is the most effective way to assure a healthy and productive life.
Question: What do you think our community should be doing to maximize culturally competent supports for our youngest children and families before they reach the kindergarten door? What role should the schools and school committee play to ensure children have the strongest start?
4 out of 8 candidates responded
Dianna Biancheria
“Once the pandemic eases WPS needs to review with our staff and our community on how to make all of our schools welcoming. This should include gathering the ideas of sidewalk appeal safety and translation services. An increase of utilizing an informal and formal evaluation of students, surveys of the needs of families, hours of accommodations and review of what milestones are anticipated our few ideas that come to mind. The community buy-in is necessary to bring the levels up on what needs to be done before our students reach the kindergarten door. Holding community forums would allow for parents guardians family members the opportunity to express their concerns and issues. The building of a strong foundation Prior to kindergarten includes Family involvement reviewing services in our community and continuing to build on missed opportunities.”
Jermoh Kamara
“An article from “Eye on Education” in 2017 wrote that, "Worcester planned to expand preschool by opening eight new full-day preschool classrooms with four partners (Guild of St. Agnes, Rainbow Child Development, Worcester Child Development Head Start, and the YWCA) in a repurposed building." Worcester Pre-School Strategic Plan shows that we need to do more than just that. The data shows that we need to focus on providing competitive salaries for educators at the preschool-age level (currently being paid $12 an hour). The same strategic plan portrays 32% of parents reported that their children had no preschool experience at kindergarten entry in 2015. This is alarming. We need to focus on providing opportunities for families from low-income
backgrounds to afford the cost of preschool, provide transportation and access to the needed information. However, being the vibrant Gateway City that we are, without the funding, none of this would be possible. A look at the Commonwealth Preschool Partnership (CPPI) Initiative shows the fiscal year is in the second round of state-funded high-quality preschool expansion in MA. To date, nine communities have been funded through CPPI. Worcester has not received CPPI funding.
The School Committee should advocate and support the Worcester Public Schools (WPS) and Preschool Expansion Grant (PEG) and its goal of reaching children from birth to 3rd grade. ARPA or the Student Opportunity Act (SOA) dollars can aid in the main time, but the School Committee should also advocate and push legislators to support the CPPI funding to aid communities like Worcester meet the demand to support preschool expansion. When elected to the Worcester School Committee, I will push and support the expansion of early childhood education.”
Sue Mailman
“It is clear that early childhood is a critical time that dramatically impacts learning and life outcomes. I think there is a serious opportunity to partner with daycare providers and to investigate national foundation grants and best practices. We must ensure that no one slips through the cracks, especially the children of color and children coming from ESL families. We can work closely with local organizations and community groups and show our commitment by bringing more funding to the table too.”
Tracy O'Connell Novick
“This is why I noted to my colleagues that I expected to see a move to full day preschool for our current programs as part of the FY23 budget (next year). We know that our half day programs do not meet the needs of our families; offering that program and then building on that should be part of what our work is.
I’d note further that some of the outreach that our elementary schools have been doing (pre-COVID) to neighborhood family day cares is just the sort of connection that we should be fostering. I know that ceased during COVID, but I hope that those connections come back and continue to expand. Our schools should be known and friendly places for both young children and for their families.”
Shanel Soucy
Waiting for response from the candidate.
