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Let’s ponder what $1.4 billion will do to “drive education reform” and save jobs in Pennsylvania—from the perspective of a povertized, disabled, overeducated, Latina mestiza single mother of four.
This one’s personal, for me, so I’ll admit my biases, without hesitation: I’ve been waging what amounts to a small war, with the gatekeepers in my area, over what should not have been a complicated attempt to enroll my five-year-old in kindergarten.
Part of my bias is attendant to the fact that I am a native of the West, where education is an entirely different, more liberal, process; I have never lived in an area that is not also a university town . . . until now—and the effect on academic matters is straining; my previous home states were California and Colorado, which rank top and well, in national scores for public schooling, so this area’s lack of focus on the matter is more than a little appalling, to me; I am Spanish-speaking Mexicana, and we are not a demographic largely represented in the Poconos of Pennsylvania, where racism, ethnocentrism, and white privilege can be virulent.
When I move to a new state, I always read pertinent law regarding anything that might affect the rights of my family, including education law. Call me crazy, but I want to know the facts, before I start listening to what amounts to the opinions of district employees. In truth, I recommend this as an early strategy to every parent: be armed with the facts, and know your state’s education law is likely to be available for perusal online.
Pennsylvania statute provides that kindergarten is established for children ages 4-6. I breathed a sigh of relief at that, because my youngest is a “late child”: one whose fifth birthday is in October. What the statute doesn’t immediately disclose is that, in recent years, local districts have been given the right to elect “age cutoffs,” and to choose the date for which children must gain the required age for kindergarten enrollment.
My local district elected age 5, for kindergarten, and made the “cutoff” date 1 September. My little one had missed the “cutoff” by a matter of weeks.
I wasn’t particularly concerned by this news: I felt certain my child’s readiness would be the matter of most consequence to the local educators. I am, after all, a trained educator, myself. This is my fourth child and, as I often say, this is not my first rodeo: my first-born has an early December birthday, and there was no problem enrolling him in school—he was admitted on the basis of his readiness.
After speaking with the nice woman who had informed me of district policy, I phoned the superintendent’s office, to make an appointment. The obvious next move would be for my child to be tested for readiness, so she could begin school, right?
The superintendent’s secretary returned my call, and asked what I would like to discuss with her boss. I told her. She then said she would discuss the matter with the superintendent, and call me later. “No,” I
