Introduction of the Universal Prekindergarten and Early Childhood Education Act of 2024

Floor Speech

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Ms. NORTON. Mr. Speaker, today, I introduce the Universal Prekindergarten and Early Childhood Education Act of 2024, which would establish and expand prekindergarten programs in public and public charter schools for three- and four-year-old children.

This bill seeks a breakthrough in public education by providing funding for states to add prekindergarten for children at three and four years of age, like the kindergarten programs for five-year-olds now routinely available in public schools. This bill would eliminate major shortcomings of unevenly available day care and, importantly, would take advantage of the safe facilities required in public schools.

This bill would provide federal funds to states, which would be matched by at least 20 percent of a state's own funds, to establish or expand universal, voluntary prekindergarten in public and public charter schools for three- and four-year-olds, regardless of income. The classes, which would be full-day and run throughout the entire school year, would be taught by teachers who possess equivalent or similar qualifications to those teaching other grades in the school. The funds would supplement, not supplant, other federal funds for early childhood education. The unique, money-saving aspect of this bill is that it would use existing public-school infrastructure and trained teachers to make early childhood education available to all, saving billions of dollars in implementation costs.

The success of Head Start and other prekindergarten programs, combined with scientific evidence on the importance of brain development in early childhood, virtually mandates the expansion of early childhood education to all children. Early learning programs have been available only to the affluent, who can afford them, and to some low-income families in programs such as Head Start, which would be unaffected by this bill. This bill is a practical way to create universal, public prekindergarten. The goal of this bill is to provide the benefits of early childhood education to those who have been left out of this essential education.

We cannot afford to allow the most fertile years for childhood development to pass unenriched. This bill responds both to the great needs of parents who seek early childhood education and neuroscience, which shows that a child's brain development begins much earlier than had been previously understood.

Considering the staggering cost of day care, the inaccessibility of early childhood education and the opportunity that early education offers to improve a child's chances of success, schooling for three- and four-year-olds is overdue. The absence of viable options for working families demands our immediate attention.

I strongly urge my colleagues to support this bill.

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