Articles

Lottery profits should open up pre-k to 3-year-olds

By Mary Margaret Oliver, Stephanie Benfield, and Kathy Ashe
Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Jan. 22, 2008

Georgia's lottery is among the most profitable in the United States for reasons that are not totally explainable. College students earning HOPE scholarships and 4-year-olds in high-quality pre-k schools are benefiting.

Perhaps based on good management or perhaps because of great advertising — whatever the reasons for the 12 years of lottery growth and profits may be — there exists today almost $600 million in the unrestricted lottery reserves.

By statute, the lottery must restrict a specific sum of lottery dollars to save for a rainy day when the gamblers are less enthusiastic, and the current unrestricted reserve is in addition to the three different statutory mandatory savings.

It is time to expand the lottery profits to pre-k for 3-year-olds. We have introduced legislation, HB 939, to do this, based on criteria to be decided by the Department of Early Care and Learning Board.

We ask the General Assembly to appropriate $25 million from the $600 million unrestricted reserve fund to create classes for at least 5,000 3-year-olds. This sum approximates the interest earned on the reserve fund. We can afford this new pre-k expansion and must do so at this time to improve educational success for Georgia's children.

The Department of Early Care and Learning Board may choose to limit lottery classes to 3-year-old children of low- or middle-income parents, or to start classes in school districts with high child poverty. Or specific school districts with low graduation rates may be targeted. Or the board may decide to grant pre-k funds to school districts where no other child care facilities exist or fund schools that focus attention on disabled children.

At Coralwood Elementary School in DeKalb County, 3-year-olds from the neighborhood join other preschoolers who are developmentally delayed and benefit from lower teacher-student ratios. Other private nonprofit child care centers also focus on combining normally developing children with special needs children, and all students can benefit from such programmatical mainstreaming.

Like the existing pre-k program for 4-year-olds, early attendance for 3-year-olds will be voluntary for both parents and schools and for-profit and nonprofit child care centers. We believe that most parents who are financially able to choose not to work outside the home will want to keep their children home also. Many parents will also decide their children are not ready for five half-days of school.

But parents who do not have a choice about working and must rely on child care deserve the benefits of high-quality early education, and our school systems will show greater progress with children who are ready to learn.

Research is uncontroverted that early intervention for low-income children is the best tool to enhance educational success. Quality early-learning programs also lead ultimately to higher incomes, less welfare dependency and lower crime rates.

There is no debate that we need greater education success. Georgia is one of two states that do not provide general funding for early education. According to the National Institute for Early Education Research, 10 states provide no pre-k for 4- or 3-year-olds. Twenty-six states serve both 3- and 4-year-olds. The specific example of North Carolina's early intervention and resulting success should inform our political leaders. North Carolina's leadership in early education has proven to be good for both families and economic development.

It appears unlikely that the governor's task force to draft a new formula for education spending will produce a proposal this year, and it is also unlikely that the austerity cuts from 2001 to Georgia's 180 school districts will be restored by the appropriations committees.

Student-teacher ratios will not be lowered based on our continued extraordinary growth, and recruiting for teachers with specialized degrees in math and sciences also seems unlikely. But because of the success of Georgia's lottery, we can afford to expand pre-k to 3-year-olds and base this new effort on proven quality programs.

And, we can thank our gambling friends for this hope for new and improved educational opportunity for some of our youngest citizens.

State Rep. Mary Margaret Oliver is a DeKalb Democrat.
State Rep. Stephanie Benfield is a DeKalb Democrat.
Rep. Kathy Ashe is an Atlanta Democrat.

Copyright 2008 The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

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