Ocean County Community Members Attend Pre-K Our Way Community Communication Meetings

FLORHAM PARK, N.J. – Pre-K Our Way held two community communication meetings last week to engage attendees in the effort to expand New Jersey’s high-quality, publicly-funded preschool, and ensure pre-k expansion is part of the 2017 gubernatorial and legislative discussions. Held in the centrally-located areas of Glassboro and Woodbridge, these meetings were the third and fourth in a series of community communication meetings. Pre-K Our Way met with community members from numerous communities last November in the centrally-located Edison and Mount Laurel. Attendees of the four meetings represented hundreds of communities and almost all of the 50,000 three- and four-year-olds who wait every year for access to NJ’s high-quality, full-day, state-funded pre-k. Attendees came from 19 different New Jersey counties and at least 37 Legislative Districts.

New Jersey has one of the best, most successful and high-quality public preschool programs in the country, but kids in only 35 school district in New Jersey have access to it. Pre-K Our Way is a nonprofit, statewide organization dedicated to bringing awareness to the importance of pre-k and to sparking a discussion of expanding New Jersey’s high-quality pre-k program to 50,000 additional New Jersey three- and four-year olds.

In 2008, the Legislature and Governor included a provision in the state school aid formula to expand New Jersey’s state-funded, high-quality pre-k for more three- and four-year-olds across the state. However, it was never funded. Now each year, 50,000 three- and four-year olds wait to start school, including more than 3,600 three- and four-year old children in Ocean County. Children in nearly all communities in Ocean County could see an expansion of pre-k.

“Parents, teachers and community members know the importance of preschool for their kids to be prepared for school and ready for success,” said Sam Crane of Pre-K Our Way. “Whether a child has access to this important educational building block should not be determined by their family’s zip code. That’s not right. It is time to fund pre-k as a critical educational improvement. There is no more important educational investment for New Jersey than to expand our successful, high-quality pre-k to more students – as promised in 2008.”

Started in early 2015, Pre-K Our Way has been developing public will while providing the public and elected officials with information about pre-k expansion. The organization has held numerous regional forums and community communication meetings, and co-hosted local meetings with more than 80 communities around the state, building a network of support with more than 27,000 individual supporters and more than 50 advocate organizations, including the New Jersey State Chamber of Commerce, New Jersey Chapter, American Academy of Pediatrics, United Ways of New Jersey and the New Jersey State Alliance of YMCAs.