States Move Ahead with Preschool Push

Preschool is having its moment, as a favored cause for politicians and interest groups who ordinarily have trouble agreeing on the time of day. President Obama devoted part of his State of the Union address to it, while the deeply red states of Oklahoma and Georgia are being hailed as national models of preschool access and quality, with other states and cities also forging ahead on their own.

With a growing body of research pointing to the importance of early child development and its effect on later academic and social progress, enrollment in state-funded preschool has more than doubled since 2002, to about 30 percent of all 4-year-olds nationwide. In just the past year, Alabama, Michigan, Minnesota, Montana and the city of San Antonio have enacted new or expanded programs, while in dozens of other places, mayors, governors and legislators are making a serious push for preschool.

Preschool Autism Program Enlists Classmates to Help Teach Social Skills

A preschool classroom which mixes
 typically-developing children with
others on the autism spectrum.

Being polite, taking turns, and the like can be difficult for many preschoolers, but even more so for students with autistic spectrum disorders.

One fledgling early-childhood initiative is finding that getting classmates involved in helping autistic students can help boost the social skills of all children in the classroom.

Preschool Kids Struggle to Get Special Education Services Under New Education Department Policy

Alexandra Berger and her triplets.

NEW YORK, N.Y. -- Alexandra Berger thought she had done everything right.
The Park Slope mother of 3-year-old triplets, two of whom have developmental delays, spent the spring and summer researching therapists for her tots and lining up a fall schedule of sessions to help them catch up to their peers.
But at the end of August, just one week before the city-funded therapies were scheduled to start, Berger got a call saying the Department of Education had denied the contracts.