By Tony Thurmond and Kevin McCarty, Special to CALmatters
We have school age daughters who were fortunate to attend preschool and we’ve seen firsthand the difference it’s made.
Every child in California deserves that same opportunity, and that’s why we are advocating for pre-kindergarten education for all kids.
Our children are doing well academically. But too many families don’t have these same opportunities and children who start behind stay behind.
More than 30 percent of California’s low-income 4-year-olds and 66 percent of low-income 3-year-olds lack access to quality pre-k. According to Stanford’s Getting Down to Facts II report, these children enter kindergarten unprepared for school and seldom catch up. This achievement gap has long-term repercussions, not just for children’s long-term success, but also for our state’s economy as a whole.
It doesn’t have to be this way.