State Profiles

Alabama	Arkansas	California	Connecticut
Florida	Georgia	Illinois	Iowa
Kansas	Kentucky	Louisiana	Maine
Maryland	Massachusetts	New Jersey	New Mexico
New York	North Carolina	Ohio	Oklahoma
Oregon	Pennsylvania	South Carolina	Tennessee
Texas	Vermont	Virginia	Washington
Washington DC	West Virginia	Wisconsin

1978		Florida creates a State Migrant Pre-Kindergarten Program using migrant and Title I funds.
1987		Florida establishes the Pre-Kindergarten Early Intervention program to serve low income three and four year olds. As of 2000, this program and the migrant program together serve more than 20,000 children.
1999		The Florida Legislature passes the School Readiness Act which consolidates the state's early education programs into a more cohesive, efficient, and integrated school readiness system. The goal of this massive restructuring is to increase children's chances of achieving future educational success and becoming productive members of society. This change also eliminates Florida's pre-k program and the quality standards associated with it.
2001		A state-level governing board known as the Florida Partnership for School Readiness is created to coordinate statewide efforts. County-based and multi-county school readiness coalitions are formed to oversee and implement the program at the local level. The coalitions contract with local school districts, private for-profit and non-profit child care centers, and faith-based institutions to deliver child care and educational services to eligible children.
2002		In November, 58.6 percent of Florida voters approve a ballot initiative to require that high-quality pre-k be made available on a voluntary basis to all four-year-old children in the state by September 2005.
2003		On April 15, the State Board of Education (SBE) establishes an Advisory Council to make recommendations for the implementation of a quality program consistent with the requirements of the constitutional amendment. Governor Jeb Bush appoints Lt. Governor Toni Jennings as chair of the UPK Advisory Council. Between June and October, the Council conducts nine meetings and conference calls in order to collect information for recommendations to be made to the State Board of Education. In December, the State Board of Education revises the UPK Advisory Council's recommendations, which are forwarded to the Florida Legislature.
2004		The Florida Legislature passes in May a fundamentally flawed pre-k bill that does not include provisions to phase in certified teachers with college degrees, an acceptable teacher-child ratio, or a strong curriculum to guide what children learn. Governor Jeb Bush vetoes the pre-k bill in July, saying that it does not meet the necessary quality standards. In December, a special session of the Florida Legislature passes HB 1A, creating the Voluntary Pre-Kindergarten (VPK) program. The program allows a parent to enroll his or her child in a free pre-k program during the year before the child is eligible for admission to kindergarten. The program provides for either a 540-hour plan to run 3 hours per day during the regular school year or a 300-hour summer program. Maximum class size is 18, and staff-child ratio is 1:10, with instruction to take place in both public schools and private centers. The bill sets an "aspirational goal" of teachers having a two-year associate's degree within five years and a four-year bachelor's degree in eight years, but does not require the program to meet these goals. The program does not guarantee a high-quality curriculum, provide a nutritious meal or healthy snack, or provide for in-service training of any significance. Florida advocates say work remains to be done making the accountability provisions more developmentally appropriate and increasing the quality.
2005		Governor Jeb Bush signs HB 1A into law in January. The Florida pre-k program begins in the fall, serving over 100,000 children. The program is offered in both public schools and private settings. According to the State of Florida, all counties have at least one VPK provider. Advocates and the media continue to express concerns about the quality of the program, including whether enrollment rates are as high as they could be given the low per-child funding rate.
2006		While claiming they did not want to make major programmatic changes to the VPK program until it had been up and running for a year, the state legislature approved an increase of $3.1 million, amounting to a scant increase of $60 per child.
2007		During the 2006-07 school year, the number of VPK providers increased by 15 percent and the number of children enrolled increased by nearly 20,000. The legislature, however, decreased funding for VPK by $14 million, citing a lower-than-projected enrollment rate. Florida was the only state to decrease pre-k funding for FY08.
2008		For the 2007-2008 school year, the number of participating children increased by 10,000, and VPK received a 4.6 percent increase in the base student allocation.

Florida's fight for pre-k has been led by Dave Lawrence, former publisher of the Miami Herald; Alex Penelas, Mayor of Miami-Dade County; and Roy Miller, president of the non-partisan Children's Campaign. With such a protracted fight, many advocacy tactics have been used, and most quite successfully. Our story highlights only a few.

Coalition
Florida advocates, private and public organizations, and issue experts joined together in a strong coalition that agreed to adhere to a set of Key Principles. Weekly conference calls organized the overall grassroots effort. Together, the coalition packed committee hearings at the state Capitol and held a weeklong Children's Week, during which 1,000 advocates, parents, and children attended legislative workshops, a legislative reception, and rallies. When legislators arrived at their Capitol offices after the event, more than 150,000 brightly colored cutouts of small hands made by Florida's youngest citizens greeted them in the Capitol Rotunda. The hands were reminders to legislators to keep their promises to Florida's children.

Media
Advocates did an outstanding job of educating the media in Florida about the pre-k issue, generating more than 500 stories and editorials in 2004 alone. Each legislative action generated a swift reaction by Florida's major newspapers and editorial writers. For example, when the legislature passed the first bill, most newspapers quickly proclaimed that the legislature ignored the wishes of Florida's voters and criticized the bill for lacking quality. Local coalitions supported by the Children's Campaign sponsored local media events simultaneous to statewide launch events in Tallahassee.

E-Advocacy
Children's Campaign launched a "100 Days to Quality" campaign focused on building public awareness about the components of high-quality pre-k, supported by a strong e-advocacy effort using e-mail and a redesigned website. Through the online campaign, Floridians were directed to www.qualityprek.org, where they could access the most recent information about the status of the UPK implementation effort, along with links to research, policymakers, and news updates. Concerned Floridians were asked to write letters to the editors of their local papers, attend local events, hang signs, and distribute leaflets. More than 20,000 letters and petitions were sent to members of Florida's legislature.

The Candidate Connection
The Candidate Connection is a non-partisan information exchange between candidates for elected office, policy experts, and children's services providers. Conversations led by the Candidate Connection provide facts and background information that paint an accurate picture of the needs of children and families. A training manual developed by the Candidate Connection provides candidates with outreach materials, speaking points, and tips. All 350 candidates running for state office received the 2004 Florida Kids Information Handbook from the Children's Campaign. The handbook, developed in collaboration with children's experts across the state, provided candidates with policy briefs, frequent voter polls, facts and figures, and overall recommendations for each of the Children's Campaign's top platform issues, including the implementation of universal pre-k.

The nation is watching to see if Florida's leaders will adequately fund pre-k, change some serious flaws in the legislation around child assessment, and make mandatory the targeted goals for securing teachers with bachelor's degrees. Much work remains to be done to ensure that the state's four year olds enter school prepared to succeed - and that voters have the high-quality program they approved.