Building an early learning movement for everyone

Editor's note: This is a condensed version of a speech by David Lawrence to Durham's Partnership for Children on Oct. 16. Lawrence is president of The Early Childhood Initiative Foundation and former publisher of The Miami Herald.

I arrive here greatly encouraged by what is already going on. You and Durham's Partnership for Children have so much momentum. I see that momentum in Docs for Tots. I see it in the Corporate Champions for Children from such business and civic leaders as Time Warner Cable, Wachovia, Capitol Broadcasting, IBM, Duke University, Merck, Verizon, the Chamber of Commerce and The Herald-Sun.  

I see it in Learner Link, which is improving the education credentials of early learning teachers. I see it in your emphasis on accountability and outcomes for children. I see it your emphasis on programs to help parents handle child behavior issues. I see it in your emphasis on high-quality infant and toddler care.

You have before you an idealistic, optimistic sort ... and disinterested in apologizing for such. Life, it seems to me, is short, and we have only a brief time to make a difference. I dream that all children have a chance for a great start in life. My compass, like yours, is moral ... but this morning I focus on the practical.

I warn you up front: You do not have an "expert" speaking with you today. But you do have someone who, like you, cares deeply about his community.

I realize that you know far more than I about the quarter-million people of Durham County and the more than 4,000 children born here each year. I also understand how difficult it is to generalize about anyone's community. You have, as do we in Miami, a place of quite extraordinary contrasts -- mind-numbing poverty to mind-boggling wealth.

How well we do in Durham and Miami over the years to come can show the rest of America whether we had the wisdom to help all children to succeed in school and in life. The good news I share here this morning is that in Miami, despite all our challenges of culture and poverty and language, we have found a way to rally around children -- all children.

I have done a considerable amount of reading about Durham County in preparation for my visit, and I see so much to brag about: For one splendid example, you do so much better in college graduation rates than most places in America. Your median family income is better than Miami's and many other places. You have a growing number of child care sites with evidence of brain-stimulating, high-quality environments, yet so many of these centers are not yet at these higher levels. (And you should know that a year of child care is more expensive for most parents than a year at UNC-Chapel Hill.)

And, as radio legend Paul Harvey would say, here is "the rest of the story": The 25 percent of your children who cannot read at minimally proficient levels in third grade. The third of your students who do not finish high school in the usual time. The nearly half of all your children, birth to age 5, who live in low-income, frequently impoverished families. The quarter of all your births to mothers with less than a high school education.

The almost half of your children who do not have the fundamentals of early literacy by kindergarten. All those children in Durham County without health insurance. The challenges you face in infant mortality and in childhood obesity.

Clearly, none of us can yet rest.

If you went back with me just a relatively few years ago, you would discover that I knew almost truly nothing about the matters of which I speak this morning. But back in 1996 when I was still a newspaper publisher, the then governor of Florida asked me to be a citizen member of the Governor's Commission on Education -- a two-year effort to look at the future of education in the 21st century.

Though I am the father of five, and though my children were raised by early education principles, I had no idea that there were "principles." I, a fairly typical example of someone believing that education is about teachers and rulers and blackboards and desks, was simply stunned by what I learned about the earlier learning years. The more I learned, the more I realized that the very future of my community and my country depend on what we are talking about today (and so I retired almost a decade ago to devote all my energies in this area).

The case I make today is all about growing the future workforce of Durham County. How can you compete in a global economy when so many children cannot read ... when we as a country lag so far behind most of the rest of the developed world in math and science?

Such statistics surely remind us how critical it is for us to invest in high-quality early childhood basics. The national research tells us that if a hundred children leave first grade without really knowing how to read, 88 of those children will still be poor readers after the fourth grade. Surely that is a wakeup call for early investment.

It is not as though the only learning years of one's life are to be found in the earliest years -- people, indeed, do learn all their lives -- but rather that there are windows wide open during those early years, and never again will so many windows be open quite so wide. It is not only about intellectual and physical growth, but matters, too, of social and emotional development. All children need a blend of health and education and nurturing -- and all must be high quality because only real quality leads to real outcomes.

The research also tells us clearly that if ever we were to invest a dollar wisely in the years before birth to age 5, we would have a return on investment of at least seven dollars that we would not have to spend on police, prosecution and prison. These are matters of investment as well as self-interest.

An educated community is safer, more prosperous, more optimistic for everyone. Many business people who complain about the quality of graduates simply do not realize that the path to hiring the most capable, most qualified employees begins with a child's earliest years -- those years that furnish the optimum window for investment.

Over the years since my so-called "retirement," I have come to believe the tragedy of early childhood unpreparedness is preventable. Have come to believe that we must, community by community, build a movement for everyone's child -- poor, rich and in-between.

A movement for everyone's child is basic American fairness. The poor need more help, of course, but the way to help them the most is to help everyone.

So how might that be translated into the real world that you and I live in? Here are two quick examples of "building a movement":

No. 1: I come from a state not well known for investment in education. But, in fact, we did pass a constitutional amendment for "universal prekindergarten" in Florida because we made the case that this was about everyone's child.

>No. 2: Here's a second example of the thinking-about-everyone approach: Florida has a law that lets voters in counties decide if they want to raise their property taxes to provide a dedicated funding source for children. My own community first tried to do this back in 1988. Good people led the campaign, arguing that the community ought to help the most needy. It failed, 2-1.

In 2002, it was back on the ballot. This time we made the case that this would be about everyone's child, while certainly acknowledging and understanding the obvious: That is, children and families do need and should receive more help.

We passed it, 2-1.

This year we will spend more than $100 million, costing the owner of a median-assessed-value home $57.88, and administered by an independent board (called The Children's Trust), on early intervention and prevention. For just one example, of many more, I note that just two school years ago we had only 19 nurses and 24 health clinics in our public school system. Today we have health teams in 165 schools.

That means fewer absences from school, improved academic performance, a decreased dropout rate, children treated quickly, and a parent being able to stay at work (and, hence, increased productivity). Or I could tell you about the millions we are investing in higher-quality child care, the still more millions for programs for children with special needs, and the still more millions for higher-quality after-school care. All this, and more, can happen when the community's vision embraces all children.

Now I give some more recent, and even better news: Back in 2002 we promised voters that we would sunset The Children's Trust after five years of operation, and they could decide in 2008 if they wanted it to continue on ... and on ... and on.

Now I live in a community that is a poster child for the housing crisis in this country ... a community facing not only hurricanes, but all sorts of issues of rising costs for gasoline, for food, for homes. Moreover, as you know, we live in a stressed time in our country -- stressed about the economy, the war, the environment, leadership and change. It would be awfully easy to vote against any taxes -- and, make no mistake about it, The Children's Trust is a tax.

Seven weeks ago, the people of Miami-Dade voted to reauthorize The Children's Trust in perpetuity -- with an 86 percent favorable margin! It is proof positive of what can be done -- if we have the vision and the will.

The case I make this morning is in the self-interest of the people of Durham County. Because this place is so special for so many, it might be too easy to overlook the pain and the poverty in which some of your neighbors live every day.

For the general community, for the leadership of this larger community to ignore any pain within our midst ultimately imperils the whole community. All of you want a community where people feel safe, where people have a chance for a wonderful education and to enjoy a bright future. That cannot come to pass if some problems and some people are permitted to fester.

All of you will have the chance to make crucial decisions in the next few years. For instance, as early as next year, this community must decide whether the next Durham County Capital Improvement Plan might include a commitment from your public school system to have early childhood in new buildings or plan for the availability of more high-quality child care.

Two years further out you can have the opportunity, via another bond referendum, to expand that commitment to early learning. In between, just a year and a half from now, the Partnership will celebrate 15 years of early childhood leadership by launching a community-wide endowment for an Early Childhood Trust.

That Trust, much in the spirit of The Children's Trust of Miami-Dade, can give your community the extra dollars to collaborate with the public sector on behalf of quality early childhood programs. My message today does not focus on a public effort, nor a private effort. A truly good future for children will require a public and private effort. The children need all of us.

You have the power to help all children succeed. Such power is transformative when we do it together. All children deserve a real chance to become contributing adults. I believe in what you can do and, most of all, what you will do.

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