Preschool Program Gets Mixed Marks

Arcadia Lopez has noticed some dramatic changes in the few weeks her 4-year-old son has been attending pre-kindergarten at Camino Nuevo Charter Academy in East Los Angeles: New words and concepts seem to flow from Jonathan’s mouth almost daily, and instead of grabbing at a toy he wants, he asks politely.

“He’s learning to be friendly and to share,” Lopez said while seated in a pint-sized chair in Jonathan’s classroom. “If he wasn’t here, he’d probably be with a neighbor and watching television, so I’m really happy he’s here.”

The charter academy is one of a growing number of centers financed by Los Angeles Universal Preschool program, which is funded with more than $600 million in tobacco tax money. The goal is to make high-quality, voluntary preschool available to at least 70% of the county’s 4-year-olds -- about 100,000 children -- over the next decade, and eventually to 100%.

Launched in March, the program is in its first full school year and has enrolled nearly 3,500 children, about 1,300 of whom are using newly created space. The program is funding 100 preschool centers. And in one of the first attempts of its kind, funding is also being provided to an initial 35 home day-care facilities where children will receive preschool instruction.

Last week, the program committed $42.7 million to increase participation in the most underserved areas of the county with projects to renovate existing structures, install portable classrooms to create more room and build new classrooms.

Although the program is still in its infancy, officials say it is already giving families more options and enhancing communities where it operates.

“I think we’re very much on target,” said the program’s executive director, Graciela Italiano-Thomas. “We had a good blueprint, where a lot of people took a lot of time to really think this through carefully. And we have a lot of political momentum where we feel really supported.”

But it is also a program with few precedents, and as it attempts to refashion the county’s early childhood education system, it still faces formidable hurdles. Los Angeles Universal Preschool must coordinate a complex dance of expanding classroom space while ensuring there are enough teachers. It also must collaborate with colleges and universities to create early childhood learning programs.

Some educators believe that the program should focus more on improving the curriculum, while others insist it is wrong to impose single standards for all preschools. There are reportedly still divisions within the program on how much should be spent targeting poor communities and how to respond to political pressure to spread resources more evenly throughout the county.

Bruce Fuller, a UC Berkeley professor of education and public policy and co-director of Policy Analysis for California Education, has studied the Los Angeles program. He visited one center in a well-to-do community where some parents now pay half the $1,000-a-month fee that had been required before the program began.

“The Los Angeles program is a huge endeavor, and I generally feel very good about how it is being managed,” Fuller said.

But he wondered whether public funds would be better used in poor communities -- where studies have shown that children benefit most -- rather than subsidizing care for wealthy families.

“If you’re going to promise universal access as a political strategy, don’t then promise that you’re going to necessarily equalize rates of early learning and close gaps,” he said.

Many family child-care providers are waiting to see whether they will be able to maintain flexibility in how they serve children, said Nancy Wyatt, who operates an accredited day-care service from her home in Reseda and was a consultant during the Los Angeles Universal Preschool planning phase.

Wyatt praised many aspects of universal preschool as “groundbreaking” but said the program could pick up the pace of funding day-care programs while still maintaining quality standards. She said she recently intervened to ensure that the program’s website listed home-based programs as well as centers.

Day-care programs that offer preschool education can provide a better environment than educational centers, Wyatt said.

She illustrates another conundrum for universal preschool: despite years as a day-care provider, she has been stymied in joining the program because of educational requirements.

“I have a psychology background rather than early childhood education,” said Wyatt, who at 56 is mulling whether to return to school.

Some observers inside and outside Los Angeles Universal Preschool say the public is not as aware of the program as it should be. New classrooms will be of little use if parents do not know about the program or choose not to let their children participate because they do not have the correct information.

That also concerns Evelyn V. Martinez, executive director of First 5 LA, a nonprofit formed to use tobacco tax revenue to pay for early childhood development, health and education programs that is funding the Los Angeles Universal Preschool program. The agency is staking its credibility and millions in public funds on the success of the program.

Martinez warned against promising too much too soon before enough classroom space is available.

“It’s a very complex situation we’re dealing with, especially when you talk about this being a countywide effort,” Martinez said. “It’s one thing to have a plan and another thing to implement it. I think the LAUP board and the First 5 commission has to be flexible enough to be able to move in another way if needed to make this work. Right now, though, we’re very pleased and 100% committed to making sure this preschool initiative is successful. There are a lot of folks in California and around the country looking to see how L.A. is going to handle this tremendous task.”

Many families will be monitoring the outcome as well. In the 90057 ZIP Code, which includes the Camino Nuevo school, there are more than 800 4-year-olds and licensed spaces for only 98 children, according to census and county data.

More than 2,490 pre-kindergarten children live in the 90011 ZIP Code, which includes several South Los Angeles neighborhoods with licensed spaces for only 441 children. Some of that gap is beginning to be filled with the recent opening of the Los Angeles Universal Preschool-funded program at the Accelerated School Keck Early Learning Center with 45 students and three classrooms.

The student body is 60% Latino and 38% African American, said Sandra Phillips, director of Early Childhood Programs at the accelerated school. Inside the colorfully outfitted rooms, young minds receive individual attention and instruction intended to develop intellectual curiosity.

Teachers address the children as “my friend,” and when one asks who is happy today, a little boy named Jesus smiles broadly, raises his hand and answers, “Just look at me.”

Teacher Jacqueline Zavala, 27, is outside helping a group of students paint vivid pictures of fat monsters. She grew up in this neighborhood at a time when there were fewer choices for parents.

“I didn’t go to preschool; my grandmother took care of me,” Zavala said. “Now there are a lot more opportunities, especially with quality programs. It’s great that early childhood education is being valued more now than at any other time.”