Free preschool spots could fall short

Special ed gets long-awaited funding boost

BY ANN SCHIMKE CHALKBEAT COLORADO

Since Colorado leaders began planning a major expansion of state-funded preschool more than two years ago, parents and advocates have wondered: Will there be enough seats for everybody who wants one?

e answer: It depends.

On paper, there are plenty of seats. State o cials expect only about half of Colorado’s 4-year-olds —around 31,000 children —to participate in the rst year. Meanwhile, a Chalkbeat analysis found more than 56,000 preschool seats available for next fall.

“Right now, it’s looking really good,” said Dawn Odean, the state’s universal preschool director.

But things get stickier at the county level. Some parts of the state are awash in preschool seats and others don’t have nearly enough. Some families may also struggle to nd preschools with the schedules and programming they want.

“ e physical number of slots versus what parents actually need doesn’t necessarily align,” said Kelly Esch, who’s both the parent of a preschooler and executive director of an organization that provides early childhood coaching and resources in western Colorado’s Gar eld County.

While Chalkbeat’s county-bycounty analysis provides a snapshot of preschool availability across Colorado, there are plenty of factors it doesn’t account for — families who cross county lines for preschool or the uneven distribution of seats within counties. Plus, it’s possible more providers will join soon, adding new seats to the tally. e new preschool program will o er 10 to 15 hours a week of tuition-free preschool to 4-year-olds statewide, 30 hours a week to 4-year- olds who come from lower-income families or meet other criteria, and 10 hours a week to some 3-yearolds. e program is funded in part with a voter-approved nicotine tax and will be o ered in school district classrooms, private child care centers, church-based preschools, and homes licensed by the state.

Odean said state o cials plan to dig deeper into the data for trouble spots once parents select preschools for the coming year. Families of about 26,000 4-year-olds who applied for seats by the end of February will nd out Wednesday what preschools they matched with and will have two weeks to accept or decline the o ers. (Families can continue to apply through the summer and fall.)

Esch, who lives in the small town of Newcastle, is pretty sure her son Oliver will land a universal preschool seat in the home of the beloved child care provider he’s been with since he was 10 weeks old. Not only does she o er hard-to- nd all-day and summertime care, the provider runs a top-notch program, Esch said, and for a while even adjusted Oliver’s nap schedule so she could work with him one-on-one to overcome a speech delay.

Although Oliver should get priority for one of the provider’s two universal preschool spots, Esch still feels uncertain about how things will play out under the state’s new system.

“Are we in? Did it work?” she wondered as she awaited the o cial noti cation email.

While around 1,700 preschools have signed up to o er universal preschool classes next fall, the exact number of seats is still in ux at many programs. In some cases, that’s because of unfolding expansion projects or di culty nding teachers to sta classrooms. In others, preschool providers are still considering whether to o er fulltime or part-time slots or are uncertain about whether they can release un lled seats reserved for students with disabilities or children of employees to the general public.

At Spring eld Preschool, a highly rated school district program in southern Colorado, leaders haven’t yet decided how many hours a week to o er 4-year-olds next year.

Director Debbie Sharpe said the preschool will probably have enough spots for all interested families if it continues with half-day classes. But she knows Baca County is a child care desert and that full-day preschool would be a godsend to many locals. District o cials will decide which schedule to o er in the next few weeks.

If the preschool moves to full-day, there won’t be enough seats for every child, Sharpe said. “Space is going to be a problem.”

Stacy Petty, who heads the group coordinating universal preschool in Gar eld, Pitkin, and Lake counties, and part of Eagle County, expects shortages too.

“We didn’t have enough seats to support everyone in our region before [universal preschool].” she said. “We do have some expansion going on, which is going to help, but we still know we don’t have enough seats for everybody.”

Petty said based on preliminary interest, she expects 80% of eligible families in the area to seek a universal preschool seat — well above the 50% uptake Colorado leaders anticipate statewide. ey’d say, “Oh, it’s not even worth applying for,” she said. at’s the case at Family Star Montessori, which will o er a total of 36 universal preschool slots at its two Denver locations next year. Most are reserved for children from low-income families, but private pay families can enroll too.

In the Gar eld RE-2 school district, based in Ri e, preschool expansion projects are underway at two elementary schools. Together, they’ll add around 80 new preschool seats, some by August and the rest by January.

Emily Kielmeyer, the district’s early childhood coach and coordinator, said she’s hopeful the expansion, which will bring the total number of preschool seats to 300, will be enough to accommodate every family that wants a spot.

“We knew the time was right with universal preschool coming,” she said of the expansion.

District o cials say there’s been lots of residential growth in the area — people who left cities in search of smaller communities and outdoor space during the pandemic or who’ve gradually been priced out of “up-valley” housing in cities like Aspen.

“We have housing starts through the roof out here,” said district spokesperson eresa Hamilton. It’s likely most families who want a universal preschool spot next year have already applied, but providers and advocates say they’re still elding questions from families who are confused about the process.

Kelli Gabehart, the preschool director for the Elbert County school district southeast of Denver, discovered some parents haven’t applied because they erroneously believed universal preschool provides only 15 tuition-free hours a month. (It’s actually 15 hours a week.)

Some providers say they’ve provided computers and on-the-spot help for parents lling out the universal preschool application after nding that some longtime clients hadn’t signed up.

Julia McConnaughey, the program’s senior director of community partnerships, said Family Star still has a few open spots for next year, and had even more earlier in the application process.

“I don’t think there was enough outreach to the public without schools doing the heavy lifting,” she said. “We had to personally ask every parent, ‘Hey did you apply? Did you choose Family Star as your rst choice?’”

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