Over half of Franklin County kids not ready for kindergarten, research says
COLUMBUS, Ohio (WCMH) – A non-profit is getting ready to kick off early learning assessments in Franklin County to find out why so many children in the area are not ready for kindergarten.
Future Ready Five created this process. Right now the assessment is a pilot program that aims to bring answers to what the non-profit said is a significant crisis in the community.
65% of children in the county are not ready for kindergarten, but that number is even higher when one looks at minority communities.
About 71% of American Indian or Alaskan Native, 85% of Hispanic, 78% of African American and 68% of Asian or Pacific Islander children in Franklin County are not ready for kindergarten, according to Future Ready Five.
"We sometimes don't get the best quality of education that we can get," Owner and Director of a Blessed Child Learning Academy Stephanie Walker said.
A Blessed Child Learning Academy is one of the 14 early childhood centers participating in this pilot assessment.
"We are unfortunately like I said, an area that is not always looked at to push our children that need to be pushed. Children are left behind on an academic level," Walker said.
Participating childcare centers were selected for this pilot in part because of state data.
"We use the state-level data to help us kind of understand the lay of the land and understand who has the most needs. And so with that kindergarten readiness assessment data, it did show us what zip codes had maybe some of the neediest of the children. And so we really put our efforts into those zip codes that had some of the lower scores," Future Ready Five Vice President of Advancement and Community Relations Neeta Agrawal said.
Kindergarten readiness looks like a lot of different things: from kids writing their names to socio-emotional learning levels, and Future Ready Five said data shows many Franklin County kids are falling behind.
"Up until this point, we've never been able to tell exactly why. We have not had that hard data to really help the kids be successful and provide them the supports that they need," Agrawal said.
The tests will be about 10 minutes; teachers will ask questions that differ depending on if the child is 3, 4 or 5 years old.
"They're quick and easy. Just getting in there and then they get progressively hard and that allows us to figure out, you know, when they know something or when they kind of are on track or above and beyond," Agrawal said.
This program will help Future Ready Five develop plans specific to each child. The goal is to learn from this pilot phase and double the number of kids involved by August.
"I know this is a starting point, and along with other agencies where our kids will get the best education they could possibly get," Walker said.
Almost 200 children will start going through the assessments next week.
Future Ready Five has a goal to have 100% of children ready for kindergarten by 2030. They said they know it is a lofty goal, but they want to help as many kids as possible and at least blanket the county by that date.