Teachers Play a Pivotal Role in the Education of Pre-K Students
March 21, 2007
Martha Barnett - Tallahassee
The Florida Constitution says it best: "The education of children is a fundamental value of the people of the State of Florida."
In 2002, the people underscored this commitment to quality early-childhood education when they added to the constitution the requirement for a universal pre-kindergarten learning opportunity for every 4-year-old.
Yet, nearly half of the children in Florida start school behind, creating an achievement gap that widens with each passing year. We all have an enormous stake in ensuring that children enter school ready to learn.
Those children most at risk as a result of poverty, chaotic households or any number of other social problems often do not receive the foundation they need before they start kindergarten and first grade. It should come as no surprise that Florida's third-grade reading failure rate exceeds one in every four children.
Qualified teachers are the backbone of any educational system. Teachers guide their students' personal and mental development and make them want to achieve. Most of us can point
to that special teacher who made a lasting difference in our lives.
I, personally, will always remember Albert Smith who not only taught me the mechanics of math, but also inspired me to challenge the rules, even the mathematical ones, and in doing so to be a risk-taker. Those lessons served me well, if not better, than algebra and geometry.
The emerging research clearly shows that better educated pre-k teachers with specialized training are more effective, respond more sensitively to children's needs, and provide more positive feedback and encouragement. Their students score better on language tests, have higher self-confidence, are more sociable, and present fewer behavior problems.
Those children with learning disabilities are less likely to go unnoticed or fall between the cracks when a degreed teacher is in charge. I saw these positive impacts firsthand many years ago as a summer volunteer for Head Start. I was amazed at what a big difference even a small investment of time could make in a child's readiness to enter school.
Why then, when so much is at stake, is the state hesitating to guarantee that the lead teachers in our pre-K classrooms are degreed and qualified at the very time when our youngest children are most ready to learn?
The law implementing the universal pre-K program is phased in over six years. By 2008 at least one teacher in each pre-K classroom should have an associate degree in early-childhood education, and by 2013 at least one teacher in each classroom should have a bachelor's degree. The current law, however, is only aspirational. It should be mandatory.
The lead teacher in each classroom should be a qualified, degreed teacher. This was the vision of Florida voters when they passed the pre-K amendment. The Legislature should adopt a plan during this session to mandate that every pre-K child in Florida has a qualified degreed teacher in every pre-K classroom.
After all, the education of our children is a fundamental value.
Martha Barnett is the former
president of the American Bar Association and is a partner in Holland & Knight's Tallahassee office. This editorial has appeared in the Tallahassee Democrat, the Tampa Tribune, the Lakeland Ledger and the Daytona Beach News-Journal.
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