Early Years Study

Re: "Early Years Study 2: Putting Science into Action."

This report reinforces the trend going on in the school district I work for (Howe Sound). The school district is finally recognizing that "early childhood [is] a critical period to invest in the development of future human capital" (99). It seems odd that they're finally catching on that “school unreadiness is expensive” (110). Out of recognition of the fact that development during the pre-school years warrants the attention of the educational community, the school board got a nice, chunky grant to invest in early learning initiative partnerships. They're now in the process of changing the name from "school district" to "board of education" to encompass the entire spectrum.

As might be expected, there is a bit of tension that is arising from this on a number of levels. Firstly, as the Early Years Study outlines, there is a training and wage disparity between ECE workers and teachers. Now that the school board is taking an interest in ECE (a sphere traditionally neglected), ECE workers probably feel like an independent country in the throes of colonization! Luckily, the board has hired a wonderful person for the job who is very tactful at developing a collaborative spirit with the ECE specialists.

There is also a fair bit of resistence from the teachers. Many are upset that "school money" is being spent in a domain that perhaps belongs to the people most trained for the job. Some kindergarten teachers feel there is extra pressure to address the pre-kindergarten population. Teachers are already taxed with time- anything extra is a big deal to them!

Outside of the controversies, it was great to read a report on the economic benefits of ECE. I especially like Bank of Canda David Dodge's words during a speech in 2003: "We would in fact achieve amore efficient allocation of resources by reducing the relative share of costs borne publicly for PSE and even secondary schooling, while increasing relative share of costs of ECD borne publicly" (112). It's something that makes so much sense- shape the children while they're at their most shapable- and it's nice to hear it from an economist's perspective.

I'd also like to comment on the fact that "across Canada, early childhood programs fail to respond adequately to the needs of modern families or the new science documenting the importance of early childhood experiences to later health and wellbeing" (107). Having two children in a family-based daycare, I'd have to concede that the early childhood agencies ARE a mess (just like the title of the chapter- Chaos- suggests). It's crazy that these programs are supported through different agencies. I've had my son in five different ECE situations, and they all operated independently of each other. This isolation and fragmentation does not serve our children- or the workers- well. There needs to be some drastic changes to that tangled web.