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Research Council Says Fourth Of Children Not Ready For
School
posted August 6, 2008
A study by the
Community Research Council (CRC) has found that roughly 25% of
every incoming kindergarten class in public and private schools are
at risk of not being ready for school.
At a press conference at the Children's Home, the study's authors
and members of a 19-member advisory board were joined by Sen. Andy
Berke (Hamilton County, Marion County), County Commission Education
Chairman Warren Mackey and Chattanooga City Council Chairman Linda
Bennett who pledged to work together to address the study's
findings.
Every child in our county and in our state deserves an excellent
education. As we provide those children most at risk with the help
they need, we must ensure that we are investing dollars as
effectively as possible, said Sen. Berke, a member of the Senate
Education Committee who helped commission the study.
We can improve the performance of our public schools in Hamilton
County by focusing hard on helping at risk children overcome the
obstacles that they face, said Commissioner Mackey.
While some suggest that the City is out of the education business,
this report highlights the important role of the city's Head Start
and child care programs in helping young children better prepare
for early grade success, said Councilmember Bennett.
They pledged to work together with the Advisory Board and CRC to
improve coordination between the state, county and city.
The CRC study found that, out of approximately 20,000 children
under five years old living in Hamilton County:
- According to the 2006 American Community Survey (ACS), 20.5% of
children under five lived in poverty up from 18.9% in the 2000
Census. For a household of three, the poverty threshold in 2007 was
$16,537.
- CRC's analysis of Health Department data found that for children
born between 2004 and 2006, nearly 30% of mothers reported annual
household incomes less than $10,000 and 37% reported less than
$15,000 in annual household income.
- Hamilton County birth data indicate that between 2001 and 2006,
25% of children born in the county had a mother with less than a
high school education.
- According to 2006 ACS data, 29% of children under five live in
households with just one parent.
- According to 2000 Census data, one in ten children under five
were living in a home where English was not the primary spoken
language: with the increase in the Latino population in the county,
this percentage is now likely to be higher in 2006, Latino mothers
accounted for nearly 12% of all births in Hamilton County.
- According to 2000 Census data, 6.7% of children between the ages
of 5 and 15 had one or more disabilities: applying the same
proportion to the under five year old population, there are 1,340
children with disabilities
Factors that place certain children at risk translate into
performance on early grade tests in public schools based on third
grade test scores from 2007:
- Children from economically disadvantaged households are four
times more likely to score below proficient on the Reading/Language
Arts TCAP and three times more likely to score below proficient on
the Math and Social Studies TCAPs than those children not from
economically disadvantaged households
- Students with disabilities are three times more likely to score
below proficient on the Math TCAP, two and one half times more
likely to score below proficient on the Reading/Language Arts and
twice as likely to score below proficient on the Social Studies
TCAP as those children without disabilities
- Students with limited English proficiency are three to four times
more likely to score below proficient on the Reading/Language Arts
and Math TCAPs than those students without an LEP issue
To help at risk children prepare for school, federal, state and
local governments and private philanthropy spend approximately $30
million annually on child care, Head Start, pre-school,
pre-kindergarten and other programs. Still, the study estimates
that as many as 13% of at risk children do not participate in these
programs.
The CRC study also found that while thousands of children are
assessed for developmental progress annually in Hamilton County,
there is no standard or mandated single test or measure to identify
the number of children entering Hamilton County public schools who
are developmentally at risk.
- Individual programs or interventions have different measures of
their success: in many cases, these measures are based on
compliance following specific models or regulatory requirements
rather than outcomes the actual performance of children.
- There is no current effort to link the types of interventions
that a child receives before they enter school with how they
perform in Kindergarten and other early grades.
At risk children are concentrated in high poverty neighborhoods.
Four areas -- Ridgedale/Oak Grove/Clifton Hills, Downtown,
Bushtown/Highland Park, and Amnicola/East Chattanooga are among
neighborhoods with highest percentages of low birth weight babies,
single mothers, mothers without a high school education and mothers
who are teens. These are also areas subregion areas with more than
80% Latino and African American newborn babies and poverty rates
that exceed 30% -- a rate that is two and one-half times the county
rate
The report identifies a series of steps that can be taken to
address the issue of school readiness:
- Identify those children who are at risk from birth and provide
these children with a continuum of services
- Ensure that parents, child care providers, parent educators and
teachers of every child work together to provide children with the
resources and programs needed to overcome risks to academic
achievement
- Identify opportunities for coordination and integration of
services to improve service provision and avoid duplication
- Connect the early childhood program providers community with the
school system to pass along knowledge and information on each
child
- Develop a basic, easy to use instrument based on best practices
elsewhere and consultation with Kindergarten teachers,
Pre-Kindergarten teachers and child care providers that provides
assessment information on school readiness for every child entering
Hamilton County schools.
- Using the common assessment tool, develop a database that
captures this child by child information and can be used to develop
school performance based outcome measures for early childhood
interventions
The report was authored by Dr. Eileen Robertson Rehberg, Director
of Data Analysis/Senior Policy Analyst for the Community Research
Council; David Eichenthal, and Shelby Kain. A copy of the full
report is attached.
Funding for the report was provided by the Annie E. Casey
Foundation and a Community Enhancement Grant from the State of
Tennessee, sponsored by Senator Andy Berke.
The Community Research Council (CRC) is a Chattanooga-based
nonprofit organization that conducts independent data analysis and
policy research to improve the quality of life in the Chattanooga
region. In 2006, CRC completed the first ever State of Chattanooga
Region Report, the most comprehensive analysis ever of the quality
of life in Hamilton County. For more information about CRC and the
State of Chattanooga Region Report, visit
http://www.researchcouncil.net.
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The Black Children's Institute of
Tennessee
BCI
