Commentary 50-Wood on Public Pre-School

Funding pre-K and fighting crime

Posted by Fran Wood/ The Star-Ledger December 10, 2008 5:31AM
Categories: Family & Kids
If you're among the considerable number of New Jerseyans who question the value of taxpayer-funded preschool education, you may want to take note of some astonishing statistics reported in Trenton yesterday.

Fight Crime: Invest in Kids, a national nonprofit anti-crime organization of more than 4,500 police chiefs, sheriffs, prosecutors and violence survivors, unveiled a report touting the results of several studies contrasting violence and crime among children who were enrolled in early childhood education programs vs. those who were not.


Two such studies, conducted over a 40-year period, are particularly persuasive eye-openers.

The first comes out of the High/Scope Perry Preschool Program in Ypsilanti, Mich., begun in 1962 to gather data on the lifetime effects of preschool. It involved a group of at-risk, low-income 3- and 4-year-olds, half of whom were randomly enrolled in an education program of one to two years with a home visiting component. The companion group, also randomly selected, received no such program.

Data released in 2004, according to Fight Crime; Invest in Kids vice president Jeff Kirsch, showed that 23 years later, those who had no preschool program were five times more likely to be criminal offenders.

By age 40, according to the report, those not enrolled in the program were "more than twice as likely to become career offenders (with more than 10 arrests) and twice as likely to be arrested for violent crimes."

They also were more likely to abuse illegal drugs, four times more likely to be arrested for drug felonies and seven times more likely to be arrested for possession of dangerous drugs.

Comparable research in another study, conducted in Chicago, showed similar results.

That study involved 989 3- and 4-year-olds enrolled in the city's federally funded Child-Parent Centers as well as 550 nonparticipants. Comparison of these groups over time showed that those who did not participate in the program were "70 percent more likely to be arrested for a violent crime by age 18" and "24 percent more likely to have been incarcerated as young adults."

The conclusion: The Chicago program "will have prevented an estimated 33,000 crimes by the time the children who have attended the program reach 18."

That's a number that will get your attention.

Nationally, these are the programs with the greatest longevity and thus most convincingly demonstrate the impact of pre-K programs for at-risk children. But they are by no means the only such programs.

Low-income children not enrolled in North Carolina's Smart Start program, for instance, were shown to be twice as likely to engage in "aggressive acts and poor temper control, anxiety and hyperactivity in kindergarten" - behaviors shown to be precursors of "high levels of antisocial and delinquent behavior later in life."

The long-running, federally funded Head Start programs for low-income 3- to 5-year-olds have consistently shown that adults who attended them as children "are less likely to commit crimes than adults from similar backgrounds who did not attend."

It's long been understood that high-quality preschool programs for children who would otherwise get little preparatory training can make an enormous difference in their ability to succeed in school, which in turn makes them far more likely to become successful adults.

What has not been touted sufficiently is that such programs, by providing toddlers with a strong foundation of learning and socialization skills, can also help reduce crime.

"Law enforcement understands this, having dealt with parts of society most of us don't deal with very often," says Kirsch. He emphasizes that his group's members "are very conservative people who don't approach this from let's-help-these-poor-kids. They're hard-nosed realists dealing with very tough populations. They understand kids become who they are based on what happens to them in their early years, and if we miss that, we pay for many years to come."

He concedes the early education approach is not a quick fix.

"We're not saying every kid who gets pre-K is going to stay on the straight and narrow, nor that any kid who doesn't is going to be a criminal. But pre-K for at-risk kids changes the odds."

Here in New Jersey, there has been an abundance of public resentment at spending tax dollars on such programs. But without public programs, pre-K education simply won't happen for most low-income children.

"It's very, very expensive for families to afford quality pre-K," says Kirsch.

Many government programs are promoted as "investments," and it's true that some pay off better than others. Looking at this new data, it's hard to argue that pre-K isn't one of the smartest things we can do with our public dollars.


My Commentary:

Posted by Zemack on 12/12/08 at 4:32PM
The implication here is if you don't submit to a hostile government takeover of pre-schooling, you are pro-crime. This is a classic statist intellectual package-deal. Pre-school is not the issue here. Expanded government power over education, and the consequent violation of individual rights, is the issue.

Whose educational philosophy will be imposed on the parents and children? Will children be trained to subordinate their own judgement to the arbitrary will of some authority, whether the teacher or the class as a group? Or will they be encouraged to think independently? Will they be coerced into "sharing" their learning experiences with any other child who wants to nose in on their current activity? Or will they be allowed the freedom to concentrate their attention on the task at hand without interruption, thus discovering the principle of respect for the rights of others?

Will the government-run pre-schools be used as an indoctrination tool for the purpose of bringing about "social change", as the father of modern "progressive" education advocated...the self-described socialist John Dewey? Or will the pre-schools be an environment where children can develop their individual cognitive mental skills consistent with each child's unique developmental timetable, with the ultimate goal being intellectual independence, as advocated my Maria Montessori? Will children "learn" through rote memorization (i.e., Give them a fish.), or will they learn to use their conceptual, abstract faculty in order to hierarchize and integrate their acquired knowledge according to essential principles (Teach them to fish.)?

What is meant by "public dollars"? There is no such thing. The "Public" dollars of which Ms. Wood refers are the earnings of private citizens taken by force of taxation, to be used by politically powerful groups for purposes that the earners may oppose such as the ongoing hostile pre-school takeover by the coercive government education monopoly. To push public pre-school funded by money confiscated by force from unwilling taxpayers...including those parents taking responsibility for their own children's pre-school...under the pretense of preventing crime is a monumental conceptual evasion. At least street thugs are honest enough not to claim that they are robbing their victims for their own good, or for the good of "society".

Why is it "investment" when politicians spend other peoples' money, but not when spent by those who earned it? Why is it just to force parents to pay for the education of other peoples' children in accordance with someone else's agenda?

Rather than expand the government school monopoly, the pre-school market should be left free. Rather than having their earnings confiscated through taxation, parents should be able to claim a direct credit against their existing school taxes so that they can use their own money for their own child's pre-school education. That some parents would renege on their responsibilities is no reason to violate the rights of all other parents. To sacrifice the responsible parents to the irresponsible is a moral crime. Aiding responsible, but poor, parents is certainly a worthy undertaking, and I commend anyone who chooses to step up in that regard. But charity is a private, voluntary matter, engaged in by people of good will. Good will ends where physical coercion begins. Show me someone who strives to practice charity with other peoples' tax money, and I'll show you a phony.

This much Ms. Wood and I agree on. I believe that the first few years of any child's life is a critical time for mental development. Consequently, pre-school should be a cornerstone of that period. Because learning how to think, the essence of early childhood education, is exclusively a private undertaking, it is a time when the privacy needs of the child must be stringently respected. So the right pre-school, governed by the right philosophy, is critical here. I favor the "concentrated attention" method of Maria Montessori, which focuses on the development of the child's proper method of mental functioning, the conceptual faculty. Homeschooling, which at this age level is well within the means and capabilities of any motivated parent, is far preferable to an inferior pre-school, which can do more harm than good. The responsibility for these decisions rests with the parents.

The public schools should stay out of the pre-school area of education. But if it is going to offer pre-school, it must be offered strictly on a voluntary full tuition basis only. Their should be no taxpayer subsidy...no "public dollars"...whatsoever. Forcing already over-taxed parents (or anyone else) to foot the pre-school expenses of other parents is immoral. Forcing anyone to support educational ideas with which one disagrees is contrary to the principles of a free society. The educational needs of the child are fundamentally the responsibility of the parents who brought that child into the world. A free pre-school market protects the rights of all parents to fulfill their obligations according to their own rational judgement. Pre-school is too important to be placed under state control.


Others' Commentary:

Posted by DiscussedTed on 12/12/08 at 9:19PM
Zemack:

You make me realize how many extraordinary people there are out there among the "common people."

Believe me, I mean this as a compliment. More brains, more thought, and more intellectual honesty than the entire community of newspaper editors.

Whatever the appropriate holiday greetings are for you, I will simply wish you a Merry Christmas, and hope that you understand the intent.

Posted by blarneyboy on 12/13/08 at 2:23AM
Zemack, I echo Discussed Ted's sentiments. If there is a pre-K developed under your guidelines, it should be called "The Zemack School of Common Sense". Don't hold your breath.


My Commentary:

Posted by Zemack on 12/13/08 at 6:57PM
DiscussedTed:

You make me realize how many extraordinary people there are out there among the "common people."

Thank you. You and Blarneyboy, whose thoughtful commentary I have enjoyed reading elsewhere in NJVoices (although we don't always agree), prove that it is obvious I'm not the only one. There is much intelligent commentary on this forum.

I'm sure Ms. Wood is sincere in advocating pre-school. But the equating of "worthy causes" with rights-violating expansions of coercive government control is leading us piecemeal towards an omnipotent state. Package-dealing statists, particularly those on the Left, have been getting away with this tactic for far too long.

Blarneyboy, I'm more hopeful here ("Don't hold your breath"). There are already some good pre-schools out there, as well as many parents silently doing a good job at pre-K homeschooling. What people need to learn is to fight for their rights in this area, which means fighting for a free education market. The principle of individual rights is the crucial ingredient to stopping the pre-school market from being swallowed up by the bureaucratic establishment, thus destroying the existing network of private pre-schools. If I thought the task was hopeless, you wouldn't hear from me again. But fighting for individual rights is never hopeless.

Support for the idea of fighting against the public school monopoly and for parental control is coming from some surprising quarters. Check out Tom Moran's column of 10/13/07 (NJVoices, Vouchers are the obvious choice.). I'm against the government-financed voucher method, but he sees the same threat to private pre-schools as I do.

Though not a Christian, I'd still like to say Merry Christmas!


Others' Commentary:

Posted by plebeyo on 12/16/08 at 1:17PM

Different groups can be blamed for the failure of the educational system in some parts of the country. However, the biggest concern I have is that for decades now, this system has been turning out high school graduates with deficient math, science and language skills. Also, the drop out rates in urban America hovering at about 50 percent should be a alarming.

As far as NJ is concerned, some claim that the present situation is due to the NJEA's inflexible attitude regarding many issues. The blame can be passed around but the outcome of mediocre schools is a generation(s) of poorly educated minorities whose chances of reaching middle class have dwindled.

Whose responsibility is it to provide the citizen of a nation with a quality education? I guess the answer depends on whom you ask. Nevertheless, I feel it is a shame that in the richest country in the world, large segments of the population are receiving a poor education even by third world standards.


My Commentary:

Plebeyo, you are conflating multiple issues here.

The first question is, is the government's proper role to run the schools through the coercion of taxation and compulsory attendance laws, or is it to protect the rights of parents to fulfill their solemn responsibility to educate their own children according to their own values, judgements, and budgets? I believe the latter.

Second, the reference to "the richest country in the world" ignores the fact that the source of all wealth is produced by the efforts of individual people thinking and working productively. America is the "richest" country only figuratively. All wealth belongs to the individuals who make up a nation, who earned it each to the extent of his ability, ambition, and intelligence, essentially...and not to the nation as such; which is only a collection of individual human beings. The proper role of government is not to confiscate private wealth for any purpose it deems vital, but to protect its citizens' property right to their own earnings...on all levels of income.

This leads to the third issue, the most neglected one, the philosophy and method of education. This is the area to look to find the answer to American schools "turning out high school graduates with deficient math, science and language skills [and] the drop out rates in urban America hovering at about 50 percent". A government-run school system does not have to be as poor as ours. But money, I submit, is not the problem. The amount of money that our current system devours...reportedly $15-20,000 per student per year here in N.J., depending on the source (not including capital costs)...is the proof. A radical new philosophical approach that tosses out the mass production method of "education" in favor of a focus on students as individuals with interests, developmental timetables, and unique strengths and weaknesses is needed. Above all, learning to think...which means, the abstract conceptual level...must be prominent alongside knowledge acquisition. Getting good grades does not prove educational proficiency.

The public school system stifles innovation, as all coercive monopolies must. Ideas are germinated in individual minds, and only a free education market leaves educators and parents free to act on their ideas without begging permission from some board, politician, bureaucrat, or politically connected special interest group.