- Republican leadership in the Georgia House of Representatives is aiming to increase funding for the state's preschool program by more than $100 million.
- Lawmakers are also considering raising teacher pay and providing more funding for classroom infrastructure.
- “We have to keep up the effort,” Republican Speaker Pro Tempore Jan Jones said of Georgia's education efforts.
Top Republicans in the Georgia House of Representatives want to increase funding for preschool programs by more than $100 million, increase teacher pay and increase classroom construction and operating costs.
“We have to continue to step up our game,” said House Speaker Pro Tem Jean Jones, a Milton Republican who led the investigation into Georgia's preschool program for 4-year-olds.
Republican House Speaker John Burns of Newington and Mr. Jones said Tuesday they will seek to implement the recommendations this session, even though Gov. Brian Kemp has not appropriated money for most of them. Jones said leaders will either ask Kemp for a spending increase or seek funding from other parts of the budget.
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The governor's office declined to comment.
It's one of a series of proposals to increase spending on child care and early education across the country, months after pandemic-era increases in federal aid expired.
Georgia uses Lottery funds to provide preschool to 4-year-olds whose parents request it, funding classes for 84,000 children across the state. Enrollment numbers have only partially recovered since the pandemic, to about 73,000 last year. But officials say hiring teachers is difficult, in part because of the low salaries paid by the state.
“There are also many educational institutions and public schools that are accepting children. They are ready, they are willing, they want to enroll in preschool classes, but they cannot find teachers,” said the Early Education and Learning Commissioner. said Amy Jacobs. , the person who supervises the program.
Jones said there are about 2,700 children on the waiting list across the state, but he believes more children can be served. He said improved funding would allow more public school districts to offer classes, while also strengthening the finances of scarce private providers. Currently, half of the classes across the state are offered by public districts and the other half by private child care providers.
“There are too few services available to meet the needs of all parents who want access to public preschool,” Jones said.
Aerial view of the Atlanta skyline showing the Georgia State Capitol. (Joe Soum/Visions of America/Universal Images Group via Getty Images)
Kemp agreed with the group's top recommendation to return class sizes from 22 to 20 students and proposed a budget of about $11 million starting July 1. Class sizes will be reduced over four years, and once completed, it will cost $43 million a year.
But Jones and Burns also want to raise salaries for kindergarten teachers. Mr. Jones said it was important to raise assistant salaries from the current $20,190 to $25,741 because having an assistant would “increase the amount of full-time work at Target.” They also propose increasing head teacher pay by the same amount as the state pays K-12 teachers. Combined with the salary increase, it would cost $31 million annually.
Jacobs said she believes many kindergarten teachers will retire from K-12. There, you get not only a higher state salary but also usually a large local subsidy on top of that.
When I talk to teachers, I always get asked about teacher pay,” Jacobs said. “And the second issue I hear from teachers is, we need to reduce class sizes, we need to go back to 20. That's what I mean.''
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The report released by Jones also includes an increase in funding for new preschool classrooms from $8,000 to $30,000 for furniture and materials, as well as funding per classroom every five years to “refresh” materials. They are also asking for $15,000 to be provided. Jones also wants to provide transportation funding for all students. These operational enhancements will cost approximately $15.5 million annually.
For the first time, House leaders want to fund the construction of new classrooms by letting public schools tap into existing state funding pools and provide money to lease space to private providers. Private lease costs are estimated to be $23 million annually.
Jones said he believes the Georgia Lottery will generate enough revenue to cover the expansion without cutting college scholarships or other spending on preschool. Last year's lottery generated a $269 million surplus after spending $400 million on kindergarten education and $1 billion on college support. That surplus could shrink this year after lawmakers agreed to Kemp's plan to increase HOPE scholarships.
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The Lottery is legally required to maintain $737 million in reserves, but currently has nearly $2.2 billion in the bank. While this surplus has not received as much attention as the $10.7 billion surplus in Georgia's major bank accounts, some Democratic lawmakers are considering ways to use the lottery surplus to provide need-based financial aid to college students. We are paying attention as such.
