In an effort to receive federal funding that passes through Harrisburg, Mayor Bill Peduto named a Mayor’s Blue Ribbon Panel on Early Childhood Education on Monday.
The panel will focus on making Pittsburgh “more attractive” to those judging applications for the Preschool Development Grants Competition, according to the city’s Educational Policy and Workforce Development Manager Cosette Grant-Overton.
The competition, announced two weeks ago by U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan, could land Pennsylvania up to $20 million in funding per year over four years. The state ultimately decides what to do with the grant money.
Grant-Overton said Pittsburgh is in “high need” of the funding, with several thousand children in the city having no access to high quality early education.
“The Peduto administration would like to see every child have access [to high quality education],” Grant-Overton said. “Those children in families that are interested in early childhood education, this is an effort towards providing 100 percent towards that end.”
Twenty experts from different sectors of the city will comprise the panel, which will recommend improvements to education practices and policies.
“We have had, for the last few decades, a lot of work that has been done toward early childhood education, In terms of professional development and in terms of providing higher quality childcare,” Grant-Overton said. “We have worked toward that end. This panel is comprised of individuals who have that expertise and can lend that expertise to our office.”
Pennsylvania was awarded $51.7 million in federal education funding in December as a part of the Race to the Top Early Learning Challenge.
Grant-Everton said the state needs to pump more resources into early childhood education because “investing in our children early on yields better results.”
“It helps to build our economy,” Grant-Overton said. “It reduces the crime rate, it reduces teen pregnancy. It motivates a child early on to want to continue onto higher learning.”
