The debate here is really about how early can we educate children. The answer is: it depends on the child. Some children are ready to sit and listen for a little while at three and others aren’t. By four, a child should want to at least listen to a story and play independently for a little while. By five, if he or she can’t, there is usually a problem, and the problem is brought to you by parents who just don’t want a child to grow up.

Today, we won’t have one baby after another. The family of four is now regarded as the big family the family of twelve was years ago. We love the little guys, so instead of having another child and letting the first grow up, we just hold the first one back hoping to keep our baby just another little while.

The problem with holding a child back is the loss of learning. A child who is held back from doing the things he should at the right time, is a child who will always be infantile. Angry parents who hold children back defend themselves by saying, “Don’t tell me when my child is ready.” Then when the six year old is barely potty trained, can’t blow his own nose, can’t listen to a story, and can’t answer in a complete sentence or hope to hold a pencil or a crayon, and the five year old next to him at school is reading, playing basketball, and helping with the family chores, the comparison is all of a sudden, “Not fair!”

Children have a right to be allowed to be people. People have general ranges of development. When a parent denies that development for the sake of wanting a child to be an infant too long, the child suffers.

Understanding development is a parent’s duty and responsibility, and no, the child who is held back never really catches up. The delayed development continues to cause infantile problems his whole life. “I can’t; don’t make me; I don’t have to; I don’t have to keep a promise because Mommy said…”

Preschool for All

by Josh Montez

The state of Illinois wants to try mandatory preschool for all three and four-year-olds, but research shows the programs to be ineffective.

Mandatory preschool sounds like a good idea – after all, who could be against education. But Collin Hitt with the Illinois Policy Institute says the fact is; the programs haven’t worked in other states.

“Georgia has, since 1993, had a program in place. They’ve put 1.15 Billion dollars into their program and have moved 300 thousand students through it. Those students have, by the end of kindergarten, exhibited absolutely no difference on standardized test scores.”

Stay-at-home mom, Bronwyn Sax is decided against sending her son Theodore to preschool because he wasn’t ready for school structure.

“He’s learning everything he would learn right at home. In fact he’s probably learning more at home than he would in a preschool environment – with mom right there to answer all his questions.”

Finn Laursen with Christian Educators Association International says there is danger in putting a child in formal school too soon.

“If you put a child in a structured schooling program before they are developmentally ready, that first initial schooling experience, if it’s negative, it can set a trend for them to have a negative schooling experience all through the program.”

He says even the founders of Head Start, a 40-year old federal preschool program for low-income families, admit their program hasn’t performed as promised.

This is pie in the sky. And why is he getting all this publicity when only 75 people turn out to hear him bombast? The intelligent question to ask is why should California put any more money into a school system that’s failing. Isn’t that like trying to ignore the fact the potatoes are burned and loading them with butter and sour cream anyway?

SAN JOSE
San Francisco Chronicle

Reiner Stumps for Preschool Initiative Prop. 82 Would Tax Wealthy to Finance Statewide Program

Rob Reiner brought his pitch for universal preschool to San Jose on Thursday, arguing that the June ballot measure he’s leading is the solution to the crisis of California’s failing schools.

“This has to happen. Our economy, the future of this state depends on whether we take this step,” the actor, director and activist told about 75 people gathered in a downtown movie theater for a meeting of the Commonwealth Club Silicon Valley. “Our K-12 system … is failing right now, and that is disastrous. We’ve got a big problem, and a big problem calls for a big solution.”

Reiner’s solution is Proposition 82, an initiative that would levy a 1.7 percent tax on California’s highest wage earners — individuals making more than $400,000 a year and families earning more than $800,000 — to fund one year of preschool for all 4-year-olds by 2010.

In his first public speech since the measure qualified for the ballot in January, Reiner addressed criticisms of the proposition, arguing it is appropriate to tax the rich for a program that would serve all California families because the “investor class” — fewer than 1 percent of taxpayers, himself included — has the responsibility to invest in the state’s future.

He also discounted arguments that public funding for preschool should be targeted to poor and minority children who stand to benefit the most. While he acknowledged that at-risk children would experience the greatest gains, he said high-quality preschool can help all children.

During a talk that ranged from serious to breezy, Reiner quoted from some of his movies, noted his ample waistline and not-so-generous hairline, and shared his Oscar picks — he thinks “Brokeback Mountain” will take best picture but that “Good Night, and Good Luck” should.

After a bungled introduction in which two of Reiner’s best-known films were referred to as “This is a Spinal Tap” and “When Henry Met Sally,” Reiner quipped, “Sally would be very happy to know she not only met Harry but met Henry. She met a lot of people.”

But the topic of the day was preschool, and Reiner showed himself as comfortable discussing the finer points of policy as Hollywood blockbusters.

Some studies have shown that the advantages of preschool wear off by third grade, and others have linked preschool with increased behavioral problems. Advocates of universal preschool, however, argue that such studies fail to differentiate between quality preschool and mediocre child care centers.

Reiner said various types of existing preschool programs — including center-based, school-based, faith-based, public and private — would be eligible to apply for public funding under Prop. 82, but he said raising the quality of all preschools would be key.

The initiative would require that all teachers at preschools receiving public money have a bachelor’s degree within eight years. Training requirements for aides would also be increased.
But Reiner said preschool curricula would need to be more flexible than the state-mandated K-12 curricula, and he said parents still would have a choice of different types of programs.

Prop. 82, which would create a constitutional guarantee to a year of publicly funded preschool, is intended to raise the percentage of 4-year-olds enrolled in preschool from 47 to 70 percent.
Reiner said enrolling more children in preschool will increase their school readiness and help them read at grade level while reducing the money the state spends on remedial education, crime and social services.

Supporters include the state’s teachers unions, the San Francisco, Oakland and Los Angeles Chambers of Commerce, San Francisco financier Warren Hellman and Netflix Inc. Chief Executive Officer Reed Hastings. Opponents include Gap Inc. founder Don Fisher, the California Business Roundtable and the Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Association.

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, whose children attended preschool with Reiner’s in Los Angeles, remains neutral.

After all the childcare wars in Canada, all the promises, debates, golden pie in the sky, here is the final decision:

Feds Cancel Day-care Funding Plan
Last updated Feb 24 2006 09:03 AM EST CBC News

The federal government has officially terminated a day-care funding agreement with the provinces that would have sent $1.9 billion to Ontario over five years.

The deal will be replaced by a direct funding plan that will give $100 a month to families of young children.

In a letter sent out this week, Diane Finley, minister of human resources and social development, said Ontario would only get another $250 million of the money promised by Ottawa when Paul Martin’s Liberal party was in power.

Mary Anne Chambers, provincial minister of children and youth services, says she tried to talk to Finley about the decision, but her call wasn’t returned.

“What does that say about their attitude to parents in Ontario, who have said they need that kind of help?” Chambers said. “I would not be taking an autocratic approach to this conversation.”

Chambers said the decision to cancel the deal would leave some 25,000 Ontario day-care spaces in limbo.

She noted some of those spaces are in Finley’s own Haldimand-Norfolk riding.

“Actually, the minister has in her own riding 165 of those spaces,” Chambers said. “I wonder what she’s saying to her constituents.”

Despite Chambers’s criticism, cancellation of the funding deal came as no surprise.

During the election campaign that brought him to power in January, Prime Minister Stephen Harper promised to replace the provincial funding plan signed by his predecessor with the direct subsidy to parents.

It was a marvelous and very high energy day. Friday always is. We had a late pancake breakfast and then proceeded to a fine arts day. Mrs. St. Louis a fine artist by training showed the children how to draw a “complete picture.” That means with a place for the subject. “If I’m sitting in a flower garden, and you are going to draw me there, what do you need in the picture?”

The answers were mostly flowers and vegetables. I got cheese, carrots, flowers, duh, sky and grass, but they just couldn’t make the connection to a chair or blanket or something I would be sitting in or on. We talked about drawing weather, about the details of drawing and then we drew.

I was stunned by the neat stuff the kids drew. I was especially impressed by Dawson’s drawing who came really close to winning student of the week. Logan actually won for my class.

In Mrs. St. Louis’s class, some of the children whipped through a good little drawing – not much detail, but recognizable beings and they seemed to like the effort. Jalen drew a magnificent herd of something purple. Jasmin drew a spider web. Kaylee drew a nightmare. And Madison won the student of the week in the preschool.

In the First Grade, it was a little more difficult. There is a lot more competition. The drawings were really good and had a lot of detail. Peyton’s clouds in the sky were outstanding. Yuta drew a dinosaur and won the prize this week because his work was just first rate.

The student of the week is based on several things: cooperation, behavior, volunteerism, manners, school work, creativity, and desire. Every class, like the art class, can add a point or a special sticker to help a child toward winning.

All children begin the week in the running. As the days pass, those who fail to participate, fail to earn a good behavior sticker, fail to come to scholar’s club, are disruptive, disobedient or make another child cry fall out of the competition.

On the chart in Circle Time, parents can see the progress. If a child has a sticker on the chart, that means he has kept his behavior in check. That’s the first consideration. An X means he’s done something he should not have done.

The next consideration is a green sticker – that means volunteerism or he’s helped a teacher or another student do something. The next is the “egg head” sticker or the yellow sticker. That means the child has won an egg during Scholar’s Club for listening and being able to answer questions the teacher asks. When you combine all the possibilities, the week’s award goes to the child who has managed to be helpful and productive.

Next week we may add another colored sticker for best independent worker. Those children who are able to find an activity and do it, complete it and put the parts away will get yet another sticker. Being a well rounded, well mannered, bright, eager child will get the awards every time. In addition to the award, children got to pick out a big candy bar from the kitchen display.

Children who fight authority, undermine the activities, ridicule teachers, argue with teachers, other students, break toys, throw tantrums, and hurt one another get nothing.

Next week we will begin Lent. It’s a time of waiting for those who are not familiar with it. We are trying to arrange a trip to St. Meinrad for ashes. If the weather is good, we will go up early, tour, get the ashes, go to noon prayer in the big abbey church and then go up to Monte Casino for a run and a picnic.

All in all it was a most interesting and productive week.

My daughter, Molly, brought this to my attention. I read it, needless to say, with a big grateful smile. Glad to be older. Glad not to have to make that decision again.

I read some of the comments from mothers about working and staying home. What was most apparent was the division. Yet what young mothers don’t understand is that it’s always been that way. To work or not to work – that is the question. Whether tis nobler in the mind to suffer the slings and arrows of the work world, or by opposing, stay at home. To die? To sleep?

As times change so do decisions. Years ago, we were able to rear a family on $150. a week. Today, that’s impossible without help. Years ago, there was a neighborhood that supported stay at home moms. Today neighborhoods are empty, and those who stay home have to find alternative groups.

Each woman is different and perceives her family differently from the next woman. Some women fly into motherhood with their sleeves rolled up and a hungry look on their faces – “more please.” Other women gratefully pass the baby to whomever will hold him or her. Some women find the world a much more exciting place than home, and others find home the most exciting place in the world. No two women view “home” the same way.

But to brutally say, however, that educated moms who opt to stay at home and rear their families are a detriment to themselves, society and their homes is out in space. What can she possibly think of “the home?”

Does she mean that undereducated women don’t matter because this law professor is only concerned with those who have “mastered the masters?” Does she discriminate if someone doesn’t have degrees?

My wedding was in the NY Times. Big deal. They probably lied. At that time, I had a high school diploma. I stayed home. I suppose I didn’t matter. Now I matter because sometime between the NY Times and the Evansville Courier, I got me an education! That simply doesn’t make sense.

And as for the children, a lesser life is in the eyes of the beholder. A child growing up in a log cabin out in the woods learning about nature and wild things at the hand of her mother who grows up to be a scientist has a great beginning. As well, a child who grows up with loving parents who work and share his life with loving teachers will also do well.

This law professor needs a clue. Muzzle!

From ABC News “Mommy Wars – to Work or Stay at Home

Feb. 22, 2006 — An alarming number of college-educated women are leaving the work force to stay at home and raise their children, a trend that is a tragedy not only for the mothers, but ultimately their children and women as a whole.

So said law professor and working mom Linda Hirshman in a 2005 article for American Prospect magazine that has ignited an intense debate among mothers.

Census figures show 54 percent of mothers with a graduate or professional degree no longer work full time. In 2003 and 2004 Hirshman interviewed about 30 women whose wedding announcements had appeared in The New York Times in 1996 and who had had children. Five of the women were working full time, and 10 were working part time. The rest were not working at all.

“We care because what they do is bad for them, is certainly bad for society, and is widely imitated, even by people who never get their weddings in the Times,” Hirshman wrote. “This last is called the ‘regime effect,’ and it means that even if women don’t quit their jobs for their families, they think they should and feel guilty about not doing it.”

Hirshman also said educated women choosing to stay home was bad for them as individuals.
“A good life for humans includes the classical standard of using one’s capacities for speech and reason in a prudent way, the liberal requirement of having enough autonomy to direct one’s own life, and the utilitarian test of doing more good than harm in the world,” Hirshman wrote.

“Measured against these time-tested standards, the expensively educated, upper-class moms will be leading lesser lives.”

The Other Side

Faith Fuhrman has a master’s degree in nursing, but chooses to stay home with her children.
“The job I was in when I had, first had my child, I couldn’t have done it,” Fuhrman said. “I was working 14 hours a day. I was on call.”

When Debbie Klett became a mother, she quit her job in ad sales and started a magazine called Total 180 so she could work from home and spend more time with her children.

“For me, I feel it is vital to be there for my children every day, to consistently tend to their needs, to grow their self-esteem, and to praise them when they’re right, guide them when they’re not, and to be a loving, caring mom every minute of the day,” Klett said.

Klett acknowledged there were consequences to her choice to stay at home. To save money, her family has given up cable, does not go out to dinner, and does not go on vacations.

“We made tremendous financial sacrifices for me to be able to stay home with my children, and I wouldn’t trade that for the world,” Klett said.

What About the Children?

Hirshman argues that Klett’s children would be fine if she worked outside the home. Statistically there is no difference in the happiness levels of the children whose mothers work and the children whose mothers stay at home, she said.

Deborah Skolnick agrees. She is a magazine editor who will not give up her job and feels working is a good example for her children, and helps them in other ways.

“I think my kids are as well-behaved and as well-socialized, if not better, than a lot of a fair number of at-home moms,” Skolnick said. “I see at-home moms whose children won’t separate from them, won’t go to school, cry at the door. My children have learned, from an early age, that Mommy will be back. So they kiss me and they say goodbye.”

Fuhrman asked her 13-year-old son what he thought was the benefit of having a stay-at-home mom.

“He said, ‘Well, I really like to come home every day and finding you here,'” Fuhrman said.

“But on the other hand, my daughter says to me, ‘Mommy, when I grow up, I’m gonna get a job at your magazine, and I’m gonna sit at the same desk as you and we’re gonna be on the same magazine together until we die,'” Skolnick said. “And that makes me kind of happy.”

Tune in to “Good Morning America” Thursday when the “Mommy Wars” continue.

Governor’s Proposal would Offer Preschool to All Kids Aged 3 and 4
By Robert Lewis
The Journal-Standard

Reaction Mixed to Preschool Plan

FREEPORT – Area educators and officials are supportive in theory of Gov. Rod Blagojevich’s proposal to offer preschool to all 3- and 4-year-olds in the state – the key word being “theory.” While most agree a good preschool education is important for future success, they want to see details of the program and just how the governor intends to pay for the proposal.

“I think it’s an excellent idea but I would like to see a plan (for) how he’s going to pay for it,” said Wanda Herrmann, Dakota School District 201 superintendent. “If you worked with school district budgets every year, you’d be cautious too.”

Blagojevich last week unveiled an ambitious plan to make Illinois the first state in the nation to offer state-funded preschool to all 3- and4-year-olds. While he has suggested upturns in the economy will be bringing new revenue to Illinois, some political opponents don’t see the governor’s plan as feasible.

“Who can be against preschool? Everybody’s in favor of it. How (are) we going to pay for it?” asked State Rep. Jim Sacia, R-Pecatonica. “This is an election year and we’re getting a lot of proposals out there. How are we going to fund them?”

Blagojevich’s plan would cost $45 million in each of the next three years and allow 32,000 more children to attend preschool, according to information from the governor’s office. The state would phase the plan in over five years. After three years, all 4-year-olds and 55,000 3-year-olds would have the option to attend preschool. The plan would cover the remaining 3-year-olds by the end of the fifth year.

High costs currently keep some parents from sending their children to preschool, said Dana Keim, chairman of the Stephenson County Voices for Illinois Children Leadership Council.

“With the unemployment rate growing and the job loss, it’s a lot more expensive. (Parents) aren’t sending as many (children) to preschool,” Keim said.Preschool costs vary. At Open Bible Learning Center in Freeport, for example, three-day a week preschool costs $25 a week, and preschool and daycare service costs $80 a week, said Tonya Kaiser, a preschool teacher.

Even if the proposal passes, parents would still have the option to send their children to the preschool of their choice or not at all, said Jerry Stermer, president of Voices for Illinois Children, a nonprofit advocacy group that conducts research and makes policy recommendations to leaders regarding children and education. Voices is a strong proponent of the plan.

“We’ve been working on this for 18 years. We have long thought restructuring education to take advantage of the scientific research that shows early childhood education makes a difference makes perfect sense,” Stermer said. “We’re really proposing to reinvent and redesign public education to include early childhood education for 3- and 4-year-olds.”

He likened the current debate to one educators and officials had years ago on whether kindergarten should be a part of the public education system.

Stermer pointed to research showing students who have had preschool tend to do better academically as compared to those who have not. He also highlighted data suggesting that for every dollar invested in early childhood education there is a much greater savings in terms of costs for law enforcement, prison and welfare.

“We desperately need this, and we need it now,” Stermer said. “When children start behind each other, the catch-up process doesn’t ever work.”

Like several other educators, Patricia Burke, Freeport School District 145’s assistant superintendent for curriculum and instruction, worried the plan would become an unfunded mandate. She wondered whether schools would be saddled with the cost if state funding runs out.

The Illinois State Board of Education is in full support of the “Preschool for All” proposal, spokeswoman Meta Minton said.

“We know the more effort we put toward early education, (the more) we’ll save down the road,” Minton said. “We think the governor is very farsighted in getting behind this initiative.”

Miss Molly is pounding the table as only Miss Molly can pound. She is insisting that I write a childcare book instead of another fiction. I’ve tried three times, and what I end up with is about six chapters on a various assortment of issues. So help me out.

If YOU were to buy a book on childcare, what would you want to read? Anecdotes? Childcare from the inside out? What teachers see? The value of parents’ involvement?

Love to hear from readers what would make them pick up a book off the shelf.

Judy

Ahhhhhhhhhh.

It was a powerful day. Sometimes we meander through our days, and sometimes we storm troop. Today was the storm troop day. It was a steady stomp stomp stomp day.

We had a brilliant early morning Scholar’s Club – nearly the whole school attended. Look for yellow stickers on the chart for winners, and green ones for helpers. When a child helps out without being asked, and it’s noticed, he gets a green sticker. I had two helpers today – Aidan and Dawson. Dawson is putting out a 100 percent effort.

In class today, Mrs. St. Louis’s class was unsure of counting fingers. Some kids thought they had five, and the others said eleven. They have fourteen toes though some only have nine. It depends.

We found numbers today from fifty to 100. Upside down some numbers look like others. It was fun. I was elated today by the handwriting efforts in my class and they are paper framed and hanging by the front door. I am awed by their ability to do such a good job, understand and follow directions.

We worked on making words again. Some of them get it and some don’t. Taylor is doing a great job, Justin is trying hard, Abby is finally getting it, and she did some good number work as well. With a little push and some individual attention, every child in the class can do it.

Jack Snyder won the best listener award today.

Please remind children that plants and marbles are not edible. Some of the little kids are putting everything into their mouths like toddlers!

This afternoon we had a rhythm session and dragged out nearly every instrument in the house. It was very noisy. We had tambourines, sticks, cymbals, triangles, shakers, blocks, and finger cymbals. We found cement is a much louder surface than carpet. They stayed with this for a long, long time.

Then we did another Scholars Club and talked about tornadoes and then we cut a tornado from black paper and mounted it on a green sheet. The kids really got into the swing of the exercise. It was fun. Scholars got cookies and brownies.

It’s my husband’s birthday today and the whole family is coming for dinner. Anne is making Cordon Blue a la Angelo’s. It’s a blessing! I feel like one of those movie moms with all the grown kids and the little grand kids all running around my big house. It’s really really fun. Jack and Wilbur came home from school with me and we made cookies and then Annie took Wilbur to the store while Grandpa played cards with Jack. Later, Edith is coming over too. It’s so American!

God bless you all – life is a wonderful experience nearly every day.

I haven’t stopped writing the Tattler, I just didn’t think it was popular. Thanks for telling me. If you look back a few articles, the article “Teaching Africa” has been changed to a Garden School Tattler. There’s a picture of a giraffe.

School has been a little like a roller coaster lately — with big peaks and long declines. The weather hasn’t helped. I think a lot of children are really tired by the freezing one minute and the coat-less sunshine the next.

We’ve had a lot of trouble with a few children and that always makes the day difficult. It’s hard to write about a difficult day. The one little boy who was not really suited to school yet has left for more toddler care, and that helps a lot.

Plus, the last couple of weeks have been tense to say the least because we’ve been waiting for the end of the “erroneous complaint” filed against us with Child Protective services. We met with our case worker last week who told us that we were indeed doing a splendid job and one well worth doing. It’s a class A misdemeanor to use the state in a revenge plot. It’s a felony to do it twice. We’ve all felt really bad about all this, and it takes its emotional toll.

But things are surfacing nicely and even the cat has been cleared of all his charges, and we’re good to go. It’s hard to take a humiliating accusation with a smile on your face and wait to be exonerated by a public agent.

Some good news! We are entering into a new “Town Meeting” honors behavior system at school that’s just as funny as it gets. It’s serious too, but the kids are all enjoying playing “Town Board.”
Here’s how it works. Every child begins every day with a smiley face! Miss Kelly spent her snow weekend working on this most delightful system which is up in circle time. I will take a picture for all the parents and grandparents out there who don’t get to visit regularly!

There are only three ways to lose a smiley face – disobedience, disruption and making another child cry on purpose. So get the picture — we all pass quietly and not so quietly through the morning and then assemble for one thing or another, and we bring up behaviors without naming names. “What do you think of this,” I asked yesterday? The children decided which behaviors broke “their rules” and which ones didn’t. Turning the behavior over to the group is a marvelous inclusive help.

Then, on the higher side, we are rewarding the best listener at story time. Abby won the award. She listened nearly without moving – mostly because she was listening – to “Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs.” It’s one of my favorites.

We are also studying weather this week, and four children won the “Good Egg” award for excellence in “theory” at Scholar’s Club. That’s a big way of saying “I listened, I understood, and I followed directions.” The winners were Justin, David, Madison, and Logan. Parents who look at the “Town Meeting” board in circle time will see yellow smiley face stickers on the winners.

We are always so excited to offer prizes and rewards to children who behave so beautifully. Behavior is the key to success in big school. The excellent, non demanding child who sits for a teacher, knows the answer, can cooperate with any question, duty or charge is a child who will be the golden child in any classroom, and we want all our children to fit this bill.

Otherwise, things are progressing at school. In my class, we are trying to put words together. I’m not sure just how much they understand. The children are writing a statement every day – Name and the ___. It’s a story starter. Once they have mastered the spacing, they can make up their own statements.

We’re making words out of what we call air sounds (vowels) and mouth sounds (consonants). We use mounds of purple mouth sounds and yellow air sounds and put the air sound between the mouth sounds with purple and yellow paper squares. Then we sound them out. If the child can sound out his word, and he knows what it is, he gets a penny. When he earns a dollar, he can take it home.

We started equations in the Kindergarten yesterday. Zero plus one is one. “Why?” I asked. You have to have a reason in math to do anything, so why not start in kindergarten? “Because if you add nothing to something you won’t get any more.” The response was somewhere between “Huh?” and “Can I have some candy?”

It’s really a funny morning. The kids are all so eager. We had four Bingo winners yesterday. I went really fast, and the “I can’t be quiet” kids got frustrated, but the listener kids won. Abby, Taylor, Logan and Justin all won a game.

It’s late – must go. Will write again soon,

Love, Judy

Great story.

Mums’ Efforts Make Child-care Centre Reality

By SARAH SCOPELIANOS
February 21, 2006

FIVE determined mothers with a vision to create a centre for child care and health services were acknowledged for their years of work at the opening of the Hawkesdale and District Family Services Centre yesterday.

Four years of planning paid off for the mothers who, with the backing of the community, worked together to raise funds to build the centre.

The community raised $71,000 for the project while the Handbury family donated $100,000. A Federal Government grant of $250,000 and Moyne Shire’s $397,000 combined to make the project possible.

Member for Wannon David Hawker congratulated the small rural community for its ability to develop a plan and attract funding for the centre, which will host kindergarten, child care and child and maternal health services.

President of the pre-school Linda Roache said for 30 years the pre-school operated out of the Memorial Hall.

She said a recent survey reported rural people were happier than their city counterparts because they pitched in and helped their communities.

“Hawkesdale must be one heck of a happy community then,” she added.

Twenty-one pre-schoolers have enrolled, two day-care sessions are expected to begin soon and maternal and child health services started last week, Mrs Roache said.

Mr Hawker said “happy Hawkesdale” was thriving due to its determined residents. “In fact this project speaks a lot about community involvement and shows what a small community can do to not only survive but to also thrive,” he said.
“It is not a rarity a lot of country communities are fighting back.

“I think the centre draws a lot of people from a wide area and it’s in a position where it will have a flow-on effect to the school with it making an easy transition to the P-12 school.

“It’s got a very good reputation.”