My name is Teri Talan.  I am the public policy liaison for the Center for Early Childhood Leadership at National-Louis University. I am also a director of an early childhood program in Evanston which has contracted with our local school district to provided state-funded prekindergarten services to at-risk children. I am here today to speak on a topic close to my heart: why spending money on early care and education is such a good investment of public funds.

Societal changes, including welfare reform has resulted in a dramatic altering of the picture of who is taking care of the kids. Today, the majority of young children, birth through five years of age, are spending a significant amount of time in the care of people who are not the children's parents. Recent brain research has confirmed what those of us in the field of early education have known for a long time --- a child's experiences in the early years are critical to his or her ability to learn in formal schooling. Child care needs come at a critical time as a child's brain builds neural connections at an extraordinary rate during the first years of life. It is this time when a child develops the foundational skills needed for later success in school: math skills, language learning, and, most important of all, how to get along with others. 

High quality care and education is available but it is expensive. Our current child care system has created tremendous growth in publicly funded child care. However, most of this growth is in unlicensed care. While this care may be adequate, child development professionals who are concerned about the preparation of children for school point out that the parents least able to find and afford early childhood education and development programs for their children are the ones whose children need it the most.

The public education system has been receiving funds for programs for children under five for some time now. This funding not only needs to be increased but also directed towards working more effectively with community based providers of child care and education. We need a cohesive and coordinated approach to delivering care and education. Let me give you an example of the problem. Illinois reportedly has a waiting list of 7,000 children who are eligible for the PreKindergarten Program for Children At- Risk of Academic Failure.  This means 7000 children will be entering Kindergarten shortly already behind a step behind!  These children are likely to be in child care programs or in homes that are eager to partner with the Illinois State Board of Education to provide quality learning experiences in a nurturing environment for up to 10 hours a day. Yes, there is a need for increased funding for early care and education. There is an equal need for an increased will to fully collaborate with community providers to reach and teach the children where they are. I strongly urge you to invest in early learning and to direct this increased investment towards serving children in the settings which best meet their needs.

In Evanston, our community has begun a collaboration process involving the school district, the private child care and education community, as well as business and civic leaders. Our Superintendent has demonstrated his commitment to better serve young children, beginning at birth, by convening this collaborative effort. We have joked about the danger of designing a truly comprehensive system of care and education due to the likely cost this system will entail. So where is the joke, you ask? Collectively, we remind ourselves of the line from the movie, Field of Dreams:  "If you build it, they will come..."  Our dream is not of a baseball field but rather of a coordinated, comprehensive system of child care and education.  In this system no child is ever struck out and, in fact, all young children get on base by receiving high quality early learning experiences.  Thank you for your efforts to turn our dream into reality.