Governor Kay Ivey speaking last year at the Early Childhood Education Leadership Forum in Montgomery, Ala. Source: Governor Ivey’s Flickr page.

When it came to preschool, Alabama state senator Trip Pittman “was on the fence,” a Mother Jones article says.

“Pittman, a conservative Republican, figured the kinds of things you’re supposed to learn before kindergarten—washing your hands, tying your shoes, minding your manners—might best be taught by parents and grandparents at home.”

What changed his mind? Thanks to the Alabama School Readiness Alliance, Pittman went to visit a preschool and was captivated.

Recalling the visit, Pittman says, “It seemed remarkable, the fact that you could assimilate children into a classroom environment—raising their hands, going down the hall, being inquisitive. It was really impressive the way the teachers interacted with kids.”

The preschool team also showed Pittman “data on outcomes for children living in poverty: Sixth-grade preschool alums scored about 9 percent higher on state tests than those who hadn’t attended, and third-grade alums scored 13 percent higher than their peers.”

These outcomes are particularly inspiring given that Alabama is the sixth poorest state in the nation, according to estimates from Alabama Possible, a statewide nonprofit.

The news site AL.com reports that last year, “For the twelfth year in a row, Alabama’s voluntary First Class Pre-K program was named as providing the highest quality state-funded pre-kindergarten program in America during the 2016-2017 school year,” according to the National Institute for Early Education Research (NIEER) in its 2017 State of Preschool Yearbook. (This is the most recently released version.)

“People look at Alabama and they don’t think of it as No. 1 in anything,” Allison Muhlendorf says in the article. She heads the School Readiness Alliance. “But we’re very proud to be No. 1 in pre-K quality.”

Muhlendorf told Strategies for Children:

“In Alabama, only one in three children is reading proficiently in the third grade. Expanding access to high-quality pre-k is absolutely critical to improving academic achievement, reducing achievement gaps, and building our state’s future workforce. That is why the Alabama School Readiness Alliance works hard to educate lawmakers about our state’s nationally-recognized pre-k program.

“We are in the seventh year of a ten-year campaign to secure gradual increases in state funding for the program until it reaches 70% of Alabama four-year-olds. This plan was proposed by our business-led Pre-K Task Force. We host several opportunities each year for state lawmakers to visit pre-k classrooms alongside our Pre-K Task Force members. These visits have been our most effective strategy in securing legislative support – and increased state investments – for pre-k in Alabama.”

This kind of success isn’t an accident. “Much of the credit goes to the program’s key architect, a quiet powerhouse named Jeana Ross,” the Mother Jones article says.

Ross started off a preschool teacher in a poor, rural area. After her own children were grown, she helped to start a rural preschool. And today, she’s the state’s secretary of early childhood education. Ross helped bring in the business people Muhlendorf mentions. They act as advocates, including Bob Powers, who owns an insurance and real estate agency and co-chairs an education committee for the Business Council of Alabama. A grant from the Pew Charitable Trust, helped bring in more members of the business community.

“Among them was Michael Luce, a Republican donor, vice chair of a Birmingham-based investment firm, and an early member of the School Readiness Alliance Task Force.”

Luce donated money to fund “a comprehensive evaluation of the preschool program—he footed half the bill himself, and the Birmingham Business Alliance kicked in the rest.”

Next, the business alliance and Ross promoted “an ambitious legislative proposal that read like a business plan. It proved convincing. In 2012, the Alabama Legislature voted to boost preschool spending by about $9 million, a 47 percent bump. During the 2016-17 school year, the state spent almost $100 million on the program.”

And as we’ve blogged, Alabama Governor Kay Ivey is a strong supporter of early education and wants to build on the progress that the state has already made.

All this work is paying off for children, families, and the state’s future. As Mother Jones explains:

“By third grade, a 2016 analysis showed, preschool participants scored significantly higher than non-preschoolers on state math and reading tests. Low-income kids showed double-­digit improvements, and black kids saw the biggest gains of all: up 16 percent in math and 20 percent in reading compared with black children who didn’t attend. ‘We hoped that quality preschool would benefit the most at-risk students,’ ” Muhlendorf said, adding, “ ‘It’s surpassed our expectations.’ ”