It seems so weird to me that Lincoln's schools don't know who's going to show up until the school year starts, forcing the district to hire new teachers after the school year begins. Are there really that many parents out there who don't at least call their kid's school in advance and say, "By the way, I'll be dropping off my kid on Monday"?
A portion of the blame undoubtedly falls on an increasing number of parents using kindergarten as free daycare for kids who really ought to wait another year. Did you know that four year-olds can start kindergarten? Yikes. That feels way too young to me for most kids, even if they are "almost five".
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I was four when I started kindergarten back in the 60s - it worked out just fine.
And yes, some parents are using kindergarten as a sort of daycare (not necessarily free, if they’re also paying taxes, but undoubtedly cheaper than daycare). For financially strapped parents, particularly single parents, all day kindergarten provides an option and lets them put food on the table and pay their bills while making sure their child is in a good environment.
I asked that question almost verbatim to my teacher friends a couple weeks ago as I helped them prepare their classrooms. I got a resounding “YES!”. Guess I was one of the lucky kids who had parents that took me to Open House, orientation, attended conferences, etc.
Another factor they pointed out: Some of the low-income parents are repeatedly evicted or evading landlords & the kids get moved around a lot as a result. But instead of focusing on how to get low-income families’ feet back under them, let’s just make sure they keep their couches off the porch. grr.
Worse than that, some kids don’t just “show up” out of the blue on day one every year, sometimes they don’t show up until week 3 or 4. Hard to believe, but there are some parents don’t realize school has started until someone points it out to them. (Usually the same parents who can’t believe that they have to have immunizations before they can attend school.)
Sad but true. I’ve seen it many times in my years in Education around the Midwest.
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