Canton Students Celebrate 20 Years of Early Learning

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Next week, the Cherokee County School District’s youngest students will join the statewide celebration of Georgia Pre-K Week, an annual event designed to draw attention to the importance of early learning.

The Lottery funded Georgia Pre-K program made its appearance in Cherokee County schools 20 years ago.

More than 1,900 children have attended Pre-K in a school district school since its inaugural year, and the school district has increased its classrooms and locations steadily ever since the first 4-year-old students arrived on campus at R.M. Moore and Ball Ground Elementary Schools in 1995.

The two schools were the first selected to add pre-K classrooms because of the scarcity of preschool programs on the north end of the county.

Laurie Carroll was the first Pre-K teacher at the new program on the original R.M. Moore campus in Waleska, when the school was housed in an antiquated facility built in the 1940s.

“I remember people being skeptical about having 4-year-olds in the school setting-- and I was too, when I first saw the old R.M. Moore building,” laughed Carroll, who still teaches at R.M. Moore. “One year later, we moved into our new building, and two years later, we made national news when TIME magazine came to take pictures of us. The pictures were published in an article about the success of pre-kindergarten programs in Georgia and around the country.”

Cherokee County schools strives to offer the free program at many of its Title I school campuses to ensure economically disadvantaged students have access to a proven resource for school readiness.

“Research strongly supports the importance of early learning programs such as Georgia’s Pre-K program in preparing children for school,” said Superintendent of Schools Dr. Frank R. Petruzielo. “Students who have access to these programs have a significant advantage when they walk in the door for kindergarten, and their probability for long-term academic success increases immensely.”

In 2011, the Georgia General Assembly authorized an evaluation of Georgia’s Pre-K Program, and the resulting research conducted by the FPG Child Development Institute at University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill showed that Georgia Pre-K participants exhibited “significant growth across all domains of learning,” including language and literacy skills, math skills, general knowledge and behavioral skills.

Today, the district operates Georgia Pre-K Program sites at R.M. Moore, Ball Ground, Hasty Elementary School Fine Arts Academy, Canton Elementary School STEM Academy, Johnston Elementary School and Oak Grove Elementary School Fine Arts Academy, and almost every classroom has a waitlist.

About 100 Pre-K slots were still available in Cherokee County in mid-September, mostly through private childcare centers.

Parents interested in enrolling their child (who must have turned 4 years old on or before September 1) can search for available openings online.

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Photo 1: Channing Futral, left, and Levi Henson are hard at work in the Play-Doh center in Oak Grove ES Fine Arts Academy Pre-K classroom
Photo 2: Oak Grove ES Fine Arts Academy Pre-K students Sophia Tran, left, and Kash Barber work on their creations in the Play-Doh center.
Photo 3: .R.M. Moore ES Pre-K teacher Kelly Street works with students Finn Anderson and Emma Kate Townsend during centers time.
Photo credits: Cherokee County School District