Lottery Will Decide
Some Hooker Slots

This sounds like progress to me too. If you want to enroll your child in a school that is full you shouldn't have to stop by every day to see if a space has opened up. Congratulations to the school district for a positive step.

To all the nervous parents out there, I can say one thing...
Debbie Sumpter-Breland is very fair and above board. I know, I dealt with her and her staff on this issue at the beginning of the past two school years. Her empathy and insight was valuable to me and I am thankful.

Thanks to Justin Elicker for his leadership on this issue.

Am I the only one giggling like Beavis and Butthead about the title of his article?

To davec:
My staff and I thank you for your nice words!

There will still be deals cut.That how the system works.

Is anyone reading this correctly? So, for those of us who have 0 yes, I said ZERO spots available from the get go because of the already established process of allowing a preregistration to occur (only from select schools), we now get thrown into a lottery system???? I don't want this and never signed up for this. Who allowed this to happen? I was never notified that my neighborhood school that currently has ZERO spots open for kindergarten next year would now operate as a Magnet school. As for this waiting list, I would rather see the first come first serve be kept as first come first serve, not as a lottery. I see this not as moving forward, but moving the neighborhood schools into the Magnet system. Hum...who is driving this bus???

I sat in at a couple of Hooker School Informational meetings facilitated by Alderman Elicker, and I must say that without his strong focus on the matter and dedication to the neighborhood, this issue would of continued to be frustrating to neighborhood parents. Even though I am out of the "Hooker Neighborhood" this is a great step for all interested parents. Great job Justin!

Nice job Elicker!

Holly -

Note that all of the preregistrants are required to be in the Hooker neighborhood so it isn't exactly like a magnet school.

Also, as someone who has had to stand in line for one of my kids I personally don't think it makes any sense. I agree that it is not great to favor preregistrants but my understanding is that the NHPS wants to encourage school preparedness and they do so by making sure kids attending preschools roll over into kindergarten.

Currently, slots are still open at all of the schools except for one: Hooker. That school already has two people on the waiting list; 54 kids went through the approved pre-K programs...I am curious about the approved pre-k programs. It is my understanding that Hooker is k-8 and does not have its own pre-k program. What and where are these approved pre-k programs and how do families register for them?

The article states:
"The school district will now make the number of open kindergarten slots at a school publicly available on the BOE website."
Try as I might, and with all the power of Google behind me, I can't find this magic list. Wouldn't it have made more sense to include a link to the website you reference?

Board of Education's Pre-K Program Makes Poor Public Policy

The Board of Education's pre-K registration policy is de facto discrimination against parents who choose to prepare their children for kindergarten through instruction at home. According to the New Haven Independent, EVERY slot in the coveted Worthington Hooker kindergarten class is going to children enrolled through a feeder pre-K. This means that some children, despite being equally prepared by parental instruction at home, are being denied equal access to their local public school. I offer my five-year-old daughter as an example. I would put Taylor's reading, writing, and math skills against any child enrolled through a feeder pre-K. She reads Dr. Seuss, she's learning her multiplication tables, and she writes quite well. We've worked on these skills with her for years. Yet, despite her work, since she wasn't enrolled in what the Board considers a proper pre-K education, she will go to an inferior kindergarten.

Now, I have at least two concerns with the Board's policy. The first is that the policy appears to contradict the principles laid down by the Connecticut legislature in their schooling statutes- that PARENTS have the primary responsibility for instructing their children. In C.G.S.A. § 10-184, Connecticut's compulsory schooling statute, before detailing that five-year-olds like Taylor are to be in school, the statute begins with "all parents and those who have the care of children shall bring them up in some lawful and honest employment and instruct them or cause them to be instructed in reading, writing, spelling, English grammar, geography, arithmetic . . ." The duty is on the parent, and if the parent chooses to personally instruct a pre-K child, that child should not be denied equal access to their neighborhood school.

The next implication from denial of equal access is that the motivation for the policy becomes unclear. If a properly prepared, home instructed five-year-old is denied even the chance to compete for a spot in the kindergarten, then academic preparation can't be the core motivation for such a policy. What, then, is the motivation of the Board? If children in the feeder programs are gaining non-academic advantages, and these are central to the Board's decision to favor them above home-instructed children, then the Board should be open about this. If, however, the actual motivation is to ensure that children are prepared for kindergarten, then the slots should go to the children who are best prepared, and these certainly might not be the children who went through a feeder program.

I thank the Board of Education for their work to provide children with a fine education. However, I must voice my feeling that enforcing a policy that de facto denies home instructed children any chance to enroll in the best schools is simply bad public policy.

I agree with Holly. This sounds a bit strange to me. The slots for hooker are already filled through the "approved" pre-k programs. How is this fair for those that live int he neighborhood but say, decided to keep their child at home rather than put them in Pre-K. This is not fair at all.

HOLLY: To respond to your question about who is driving these changes and who "allowed this to happen", it is a group of 20-30 concerned parents from the Hooker district who showed up to 3 neighborhood meetings to discuss how to improve the old system. The alternative to getting "thrown into" a lottery system was not having a waiting list and having to physically go to the Board of Ed every day to see if a slot had opened up. As to your comment that neighborhood schools are moving into a magnet system, that is not true because only neighborhood kids are allowed in the lottery for these schools. Neighborhood parents had plenty of opportunities to express their opinions about these issues.

NOGAME: I am one of those concerned about what I see happening to MY neighborhood school and was not aware or could not attend the meetings. I have been through this process once and soon will be again. Being thrown into a lottery is not the way to go. Like I said before, first come first served.
I agree I do not want to see parents having to go down town each and every day, (sometimes more) to see if a spot opened, but a lottery when there are already 0 spots open???
Having your child in the Magnet school process is wonderful (I have been lucky), IF you can get your child through that lottery...against all the other children applying from all of the different towns. The option is paying to attend another head-start program in the area. Some can not afford that.

We have expressed our opinions before about this, but because someone driving the bus has a different agenda, they have gone unheard for many years. As for the comment on only the "neighborhood kids" can be put into this lottery. By what definition is this? I know of several today who still attend Hooker using fake addresses to attend a school out of their district. We thought we had addressed this last year, yet come to find out the game continues on. Until we change the drivers of the bus, our neighborhood schools are in jeopardy.

Jeff: I sympathize with you because you have clearly prepared your child well for school at home and you are right that it is not fair that kids who attend certain preschools can preregister. In general, though, research clearly shows that kids who attend preschool are more prepared for school than those who do not. The Board of Ed's preregistration policy is intended to encourage more parents to send their kids to preschool, something that improves the school readiness of our community's kids (despite exceptions like your child).

Why is it that so many view Worthington Hooker School as the Harvard of public education?! Consider other New Haven Public Schools rather than being so hell bent on your child attending Hooker. Life will go on and your child may very well still becoem a success in life if your pre-k student isnt "accepted" into Hooker. Come on people!!

It isn't just "Hooker-mania." To me, the problem is that every slot in our local school has gone to children in pre-K programs. This (1) in essence changes the state legislature's school entry age from five to earlier, making preschool mandatory, and (2)rubs against the duty of the school board to "give all the children of the school district as nearly equal advantages as may be practicable." C.G.S.A. § 10-220. Two children equally prepared, are not given equal consideration in attending the local school of their peers.

I agree with Jeff.

How unfair of a system and how wrong making a pre-K program the prerequisite for preregistration because (that is implied) only at a pre-K program a child will be fostered. This approach assumes that every parent is a looser ... Right?
But later that same parent is seen as a competent homework helper?

Both of my children spent their pre-K years with me at home. The main reason: we raised our children bi-lingual and wanted to make sure that they can speak fluently their mother's language. And we were confident that with me (now finishing my dissertation) taking care of two children, not only the teacher-child ratio of 1 : 2 would beat any pre-school program but that my level of formal education far exceeds the average pre-school teacher's.

Other than Jeff with his kids we played in the mud, sang and danced, went to the beach, and did all sorts of crafts and fun stuff. If they wanted to broaden their knowledge I more than happily complied and explained the world.

Did that approach work out? Of course! They speak and read two languages. Both had easy and successful transitions into kindergarten. Both are not really challenged in their grades. Some times I even wonder what they do at school all day long. So little outcome.

Of course we had to fight hard getting them into our neighborhood school - and we are still upset that Leila day children are hampered and pampered and have first choice ....

If NHPS wants to give disadvantaged children a leg up by louring their parents to enroll them into school readiness programs - granting special rights to privileged Leila day kids (and all the other private programs) does not seem the right way.

How about checking the facts before you complain? This is NOT about "privileged Leila Day children". LD qualifies as a site with preregistration only because it has school readiness slots--which are for DISadvantaged children. Same is true of any other private preschool--the school is only eligible for pre-registration if they have school readiness slots.

SBJ-Yes, the pre-schools have to have 'school-readiness' slots, but more often than not those slots are not going to disadvantaged children at Hooker.

nogame--if the true purpose is to encourage parents to send their kids to pre-school, then why is the pre-registration limited to a small number of area pre-schools. There are many quality pre-schools in the area that are not part of the pre-registration.

Robert--I agree this is a positive step, but I'm not about to pat them on the back for doing something that is so common sense. It was absolutely ridiculous to require parents to show up at the board of ed. every day to see if a slot opened up. Moreover, even though this is a step in the right direction, it would take twenty more common-sense steps to make this a sensible rational system. I think we can hold the Board of Ed to a higher standard.

schoolsagain: two responses to your question to me: 1) only private preschools that offer School Readiness slots are on the preregistration list - hopefully providing an incentive to more private preschools to offer School Readiness slots; 2) to protect the system from charges that "privileged" kids at private preschools that do not offer School Readiness slots are buying their way into Hooker(see post by Claudia).

Every kid at a private preschool that offers school readiness slots is allowed to preregister.
I repeat that: every kid. And I think we all agree that the vast majority at private preschools are privileged. Privileged because their parents can afford the tuition.

What constitutes privileged and disadvantaged is a matter of definition.

Fact is if parents choose to have their children not enrolled in any program they are disadvantaged versus the preschool children when it comes to preregistration. This little fact can open up your neighbor hood school or not. And as Jeff stated that does not seem to fulfill the intention of the CT school law.

If it would be only about attracting disadvantaged children into early education and consequently closing the achievement gap then the preregistration should be limited to these children. But it is not. Otherwise my LD friends could not have preregistered their children.

p.s. In my earlier post I meant luring and not louring (yep - English as second language ...). And don't get me wrong LD folks - I think your program is the best! Still - most of the children you deal with are not disadvantaged.

For the record, I agree with Claudia and Jeff's criticisms of the preregistration process. It doesn't make sense for Jeff's child not to have the same opportunity to preregister as a child (whether disadvantaged or privileged) who goes to Leila Day. But it was clear from listening to Will Clark at one the neighborhood meetings about this subject that the BoE sees the preregistration process as something that encourages preschool attendance, which is something that promotes school readiness. So even if the process doesn't make sense in the same way in all neighborhoods, it is something that, on balance, has been positive for kids across the city. Given that feeling at BoE and the general emphasis statewide and nationally on pre-k education, it is clear that the preregistration policy is not going anywhere.

exactly right, nogame...that is the logic and on balance it works. policies are made up for what works on balance. it greatly benefits most NHPS kids and schools to encourage preschool.
and let's talk about advantage vs. disadvantage....it's not like the folks who keep their kids home and provide this great pre-eduation are disadvantaged.
we're arguing over which group of advantaged kids gets into Hooker here...advantaged parents who play the game vs. advantaged parents who opt out, by choice, and then want the rules changed.
with the challenges facing the NHPS and most of the children in this city, it's pretty hard to get too worked up about this fight.

Many students who read well in their Kindergarten and first grade school years usually are "caught by the rest of the pack" by third grade. That's for starters. Read any education journal ... Harvard, Instructor, American Educator ... and inform yourself.

Second, some do not have the luxury of sending their children to a free public preschool and must pay for their children to attend preschool, my wife and I included. We make tremendous sacrifices to afford the tuition for our daughter to receive the same free preschool experience many New Haven kids get for free. We hardly are privileged.

Finally, if you are wondering about what your children are doing in school all day, why not speak to the teacher, volunteer in your child's school for even an hour a week or talk to you child ... instead of wasting time here pontificating?

This isn't just the "privileged" private preschool kids getting in. My son was one of the kids allowed to pre-register in 2004. Remember the uproar of 2004? He did not attend Leila Day's preschool program (which operates on a sliding scale, btw). So this is not about privileged children in private preschools. My kid went to the program at Gateway...and he got a spot at Hooker.