By Leslie Boney GREENSBORO (July 24, 2024) – A surprisingly large experiment is ramping up surprisingly quietly in Guilford County. If it’s successful, it could change the way we think about public investment in early childhood education, and the implications of that investment for our future workforce and social structure. Over 12 years from 2017-2029,… READ MORE
Early Childhood: Do what it takes
RALEIGH (September 22, 2022) – Everyone has taken a hit during the COVID pandemic. But some sectors – especially pre-school for our youngest learners – have taken a bigger hit than others. Any way you paint it, it’s not a pretty picture. Child-care workers in North Carolina made a paltry $24,600 a year in 2020…. READ MORE
NC Pre-K: Pay the folks who teach our kids
RALEIGH (September 22, 2022) – NC Pre-K is an effective, nationally recognized program launched by former Gov. Mike Easley for at-risk 4-year-olds. Yet, as researchers from the National Institute for Early Education Research (NIEER) at Rutgers University found before the pandemic in 2018, it reached only 47% of eligible children. And 53% – nearly 33,000… READ MORE
CEOs: A moral obligation to our youngest readers
CARY (April 14, 2021) – In the wake of the coronavirus pandemic and learning losses among the state’s most vulnerable students, North Carolina needs to double down on early-childhood education and literacy, a group of prominent CEOs said today. “COVID learning losses have impacted our youngest students the hardest – and particularly our students of… READ MORE
Don Flow: The case for NC education investments
EDITOR’S NOTE: As state legislators returned to Raleigh recently for their 2021 session, Winston-Salem businessman Don Flow shared the following thoughts with legislative leaders. By Don Flow America is in the midst of enormous turmoil, with rural whites and urban blacks caught in the same undercurrent. Although they express their frustration and anger in different ways… READ MORE
A moral imperative for our kids
DURHAM (August 21, 2019) – To fix North Carolina’s leaky education pipeline, we need to start at the beginning: Pre-kindergarten. “It lays the foundation for third-grade reading proficiency,” Jim Hansen, PNC Bank’s Regional President for Eastern North Carolina, told the NC Chamber’s Education & Workforce Conference yesterday. Hansen is part of a group of executives… READ MORE
Where We Stand – Pre-K: Prime those 4-year-olds to learn
RALEIGH (June 12, 2019) – We’re finally starting to get it: Improved student performance starts well before kindergarten. And that means getting more 4-year-olds into high-quality pre-kindergarten. Recent research indicates that the benefits of quality Pre-K prepare a child for academic success at least through eighth grade. For several years now, academics and business executives alike… READ MORE
NC Pre-K: 33,000 kids eligible, but can’t get it
RALEIGH (January 17, 2019) – The key to a student’s academic success is a strong foundation – and that foundation needs to be built before formal schooling even begins. So a group of North Carolina business leaders called Thursday for the state to revamp funding for its nationally recognized pre-kindergarten program so that it reaches… READ MORE