California Dreaming?

Since Kevin seems to have launched us on a TV theme, I'll pick up the thread by sharing that one of the fun (read: infuriating) things about working on preschool issues recently has been watching the ongoing telenovela that is Rob Reiner's advocacy for universal Pre-K in California. (And for those of you who are expecting a Meathead joke at about this point, I'm sorry. I was less than a year old when All in the Family went off the air, so you ain't gettin' none of that here, kids.)

For those of you that have been living under a rock--or just aren't as much of a pre-K geek as I am--Reiner is the lead backer of Proposition 82, a California ballot initiative that would raise the marginal state tax on income over $400,000 ($800,000 for couples) from 9.3 to 11 percent--and use the proceeds to fund universal Pre-K for all four-year-olds in the state whose families want it. It's not exactly a secret that I think universal pre-k is a good idea, which is what makes the soap operatic turn the Prop. 82 debate has taken--it's becoming, essentially, a debate about Reiner--very frustrating.

As a high-profile Democratic activist and donor, Reiner was guaranteed to be a lightning rod on this issue. But the apparently dumb choices he's made: allowing taxpayer funds from the state "First 5" Commission that he chairs to be spent for what appears to be pro-Prop. 82 advertising, paying the Prop. 82 campaign manager as a First 5 commission consultant--one might even question the wisdom of not stepping down from the Commission when Prop. 82 first launched and even Michael Stivic could see the potential for conflicts and controversy--don't help the situation.

Polling suggests the three-ring circus around Reiner hasn't harmed Prop. 82's prospects, although it may be too early to tell, and there are reasons to believe such polls aren't always the best predictor of how people will actually vote. Whatever the case may be, the soap operatic attention to Reiner isn't helping to raise the level of debate around pre-k or focus it on the substantive issues here.

And there are substantive issues here. Universal Pre-k is good, but Prop. 82 isn't perfect. For example, Berkeley's Bruce Fuller has gotten a lot of ink arguing that a narrowly targeted preschool program for poor and working class families would be a better investment. I think he's wrong about that, for reasons I'll explain some other time, but it's a valid concern that deserves more serious discussion. I admire the initiative's emphasis on teacher quality, but I'm not sure adding a whole new type of teacher certification to California's already convoluted K-12 teacher credentialling system is the best way to move forward here. Kevin doesn't think dedicated revenues (as opposed to general revenues), such as the tax Prop. 82 would establish, are a good way to fund social programs.

And it would be great to have a richer debate about what mix of providers ought to be included in a state-funded preschool system. The initiative leaves space for a variety of types of providers (although it appears to preclude the type of preschool only charters that are having a positive impact in Washington, D.C.), but it's going to be up to county education offices to determine who really gets to take part. While there's been some reporting about the concerns of private preschool and child care providers that they'll be left out of the program (and some of them should be, because of poor quality!), no one's launching the broader debate that needs to happen about what range of choices state-funded preschool programs should offer parents, the trade-offs between parent choice and quality control, and how to integrate private and faith-based providers into government-funded educational programs. That's too bad because these are important debates that could also help inform other education debates in California and elsewhere, such as the charter school debate.

Which leads me to the big question: What happens if Prop. 82 passes? Right now, I think the pre-k advocacy community is looking to Prop. 82 with high hopes that it will open up a new wave of pre-k expansion and investment nationally. But there's also a darker possibility. What happens if Prop. 82's implementation is chaotic, or if the program has lousy results? Advocates, including Reiner, are promising a lot here, and there's a danger, as both Head Start and the charter movement could warn them, that overpromising can turn out to come back and haunt you. More significantly, delivering good results is going to require that preschool programs be high-quality, and while the initiative includes a lot of good language and provisions designed to ensure that, making sure that all participating centers are high-quality--particularly in a state the size of and with the political complexity of California, and when control of who gets funding is decentralized to county education offices--will be a huge challenge. That doesn't mean that I think Prop. 82 is a bad idea. But I do think that , for pre-k supporters, its passage, should it occur, is just the start of the real work, not the end. And, unfortunately, the mess Reiner & co. have made of what should have been relatively straightforward politics here don't inspire confidence about the Prop. 82 supporters' ability to navigate the complexities of getting to quality here.