Kristen Kerr, New York State Association for the Education of Young Children

Opinions

Arne Duncan: Universal preschool is a sure path to the middle class
Washington Post Opinions (April 18, 2013) President Obama put forward a plan last week to make access to high-quality early learning a reality for every 4-year-old in America by making full-day preschool available to families with incomes at or below 200 percent of the federal poverty line. -see opinion

Upward Mobility
Obama's plan to expand pre-K education is a step in a long catch-up game
Time Magazine (March 4, 2013) By Fareed Zakaria - America has long been seen--by its citizens and the world--as the place where anyone can make it. And yet studies from the past two decades all point to a different reality. -see opinion

Capitalists for Preschool
The New York Times (March 1, 2013) Opinion By JOHN E. PEPPER Jr. and JAMES M. ZIMMERMAN - In his State of the Union address, President Obama called for making preschool available to every 4-year-old in America, opening a welcome discussion on whether and how to make the investments needed to realize this vision. -see opinion

Another Voice: Early intervention is key to breaking cycle of poverty
The Buffalo News (February 27, 2013) Opinion by Anne Ryan - In his recent State of the Union address, President Obama called for making “high-quality preschool available to every single child in America.” Economists agree that these investments are not just a good idea, they are critical to ending cycles of poverty. -see opinion

LeBrun: Tax cap denies a 'sound, basic' education system
Times Union (February 24, 2013) Commentary by Fred LeBrun - A cornerstone of the Cuomo administration's self-declared tower of accomplishments was marked for demolition last week. It can't be blown up high enough or fast enough. -see commentary

Guest view: Panel can chart new course for state education
UTICAOD.COM (September 30, 2012) Opinion By Billy Easton - More than 25 years of research shows when 4-year-olds attend pre-kindergarten they do better in school and are more likely to graduate. They are more likely to succeed in college, they earn higher incomes over the course of their lives, and they are less likely to end up in prison. -see opinion

Suggestions include ending competitive grants
Syracuse Post Standard (September 24, 2012) Opinion by Billy Easton - To the Editor:New York state is at an educational crossroads. Will our high-need schools sink into what the state education commissioner calls ''educational insolvency,'' or will New York state fulfill its commitments to educational excellence and opportunity? -see opinion

My view: Obama, Romney need to know one thing about early childhood education – start over
CNN.com / Schools of Thought blog (August 29, 2012) By Nancy Carlsson-Page - (CNN) - Here’s what I would say to the presidential candidates (in case they ask me) about what we need to do to give the best education possible to our nation’s youngest members. -see opinion

Quality needed in early education
lohud.com (April 7, 2012) Opinion by Marsha Basloe and Kathy Halas - Congratulations Gov. Cuomo, you did it again. An on-time budget in New York is certainly something to be proud of. We know it takes a lot of calculating to do what’s best for the people of New York with the resources you have. We did a little calculating of our own on behalf of the people of New York that are sometimes forgotten— the 1.2 million children in the birth to age 5 category. -see opinion

Guest Viewpoint: Pre-K, kindergarten under threat
Cutting programs would make achievement gap worse
stargazette.com (March 30, 2012) By Carl T. Hayden -School districts across New York are caught in a huge squeeze right now. Three years of reductions in aid from Albany have many running huge deficits. -see viewpoint

Cuomo should push for pre-K funding boost
lohud.com (February 14, 2012) Editorial by the Journal News - Gov. Andrew Cuomo, who pledged in his State of the State address to become the “lobbyist” for New York’s schoolchildren, should go to bat for them in a realm that most assuredly will mean a better educational experience: making prekindergarten available to more students. -see editorial

We Can Overcome Poverty's Impact on School Success
Education Week (January 17, 2012) Commentary by Michael A. Rebell and Jessica R. Wolff - In passing the No Child Left Behind Act in 2001, Congress stated that one of the law's main purposes was closing the achievement gap between disadvantaged children and their better-off peers by ensuring that all students in the United States would be proficient in meeting challenging academic standards by 2014. -see commentary

Raising Standards for Head Start
New York Times (January 3, 2012) Editorial - The Head Start program, which prepares disadvantaged 3- and 4-year-olds for school, has served nearly 30 million children since it was created in 1965. While there is little doubt that the federal program is critically important for these children and their parents, quality varies widely among programs. -see editorial

Class Matters. Why Won’t We Admit It?
New York Times (December 11, 2011) Op-Ed by Helen F. Ladd and Deward D. Fiske - Durham, N.C. - NO one seriously disputes the fact that students from disadvantaged households perform less well in school, on average, than their peers from more advantaged backgrounds. But rather than confront this fact of life head-on, our policy makers mistakenly continue to reason that, since they cannot change the backgrounds of students, they should focus on things they can control. -see opinion

The Real No-Brainer
Huffington Post / Education (October 22, 2011) Opinion by Elizabeth Gregory - Last week NYTimes columnist Nicholas Kristof endorsed major investment in early childhood education as the only way out of poverty for millions -- the only way to even the playing field for all citizens. -see opinion

Occupy the Classroom
New York Times (October 19, 2011) Opinion by Nicholas D. Kristof - Occupy Wall Street is shining a useful spotlight on one of America’s central challenges, the inequality that leaves the richest 1 percent of Americans with a greater net worth than the entire bottom 90 percent. -see opinion

How to Help Young Men? Start When They're Children
The Huffington Post (October 11, 2011) Opinion by Dr. Harold Koplewicz - New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg recently announced an ambitious project to help the more than a quarter million young black and Latino men in our city who seem to be slipping into a kind of dysfunctional parallel universe: failing in school, finding no jobs, and landing, in appalling numbers, in prison. Bloomberg and philanthropist George Soros each pledged $30 million personally, to cover about half of the project, dubbed the Young Men's Initiative. -see opinion

Early Learning on the Brain: Policymakers, Take Note
huffingtonpost.com (October 11, 2011) Opinion by Susan Ochshorn - The day after NBC's Education Nation summit, former NYC school chancellor Harold Levy weighed in on our national conversation about education, on display, for millions, at the broadcaster's annual extravaganza. "Irrelevant and quaint," he declared, lambasting a panel of ten of the nation's governors for missing the boat on the newest wave of scientific research on brain development and early learning. "The power of brain research... to revolutionize teaching and learning simply hadn't gotten through to the governors." -see opinion

Fed economist: Investing in poor kids pays off
Portland Business Journal (October 3, 2011) By Wendy Culverwell - Investing early in the educations of poor and at-risk children pays greater dividends than almost any other form of economic development, according to research by a Federal Reserve economist. -see opinion

Delay Kindergarten at Your Child’s Peril
New York Times / Sunday Review (September 24, 2011) Opinion by Sam Wang and Sandra Aamodt - THIS fall, one in 11 kindergarten-age children in the United States will not be going to class. Parents of these children often delay school entry in an attempt to give them a leg up on peers, but this strategy is likely to be counterproductive. -see opinion

Invest in violence prevention efforts
Now is a good time to invest in prevention efforts
DemocratandChronicle.com (September 21, 2011) Opinion - With the rates of crime and violence down significantly both locally and across the country, what ordinarily would be major issues in the fall election campaign are hardly mentioned. Smart lawmakers and policymakers won't become complacent. -see opinion

Diane Ravitch On How To Fix K-12
Forbes (August 31, 2011) Opinion by Diane Ravitch - To improve education, the first thing needed is a sense of modesty and scale. Education is a complex activity that involves students, teachers, administrators, parents, legislators, and the mass media. No single program will produce fast change. It won’t happen, and you will be disappointed. -see opinion