Competition Criteria for the Development Grant

The US Dept of Education and the Dept. of Health and Human Services released the application criteria and standards for the Development Grant competition today.

The Grant has been divided into the Development Grant for states which currently have no, or a small, state funded pre-school program (Alabama, Alaska, Arizona, Hawaii, Idaho, Indiana, Missouri, Mississippi, Montana, Nevada, New Hampshire, North Dakota, South Dakota, Utah, and Wyoming) and the Expansion Grant for states which have a state funded program and/or have received RTT-ELC funds.

This grant will prepare states to participate in PreSchool for All which has been allocated funds in the FY2015 budget. Both grants are targeted to regionally diverse communities with a high degree of need (families in the low to moderate income range).

Both of these grants are for the development or expansion of high quality pre-school programs. They require a high degree of collaboration between a state lead agency and a subgrantee which can be an early learning provider. Specifics of the application can be found at the Office of Early Learning.

What is most interesting about this competition are the requirements and definitions of quality. Like so many state and federal early childhood education initiatives and proposed legislation, this competition requires a high, and strictly defined, level of accountability. It is these very requirements, measures, and mandates that will increasingly have impact on the Montessori community of public and private schools and programs. Even if your school chooses not to serve this population of children, and even decides to disregard QRIS, as the political landscape continues to embrace these definitions of high quality, all early childhood education programs will be impacted. Already ratios and maximum group size limits, materials restrictions, health and safety standards, and limits on mixed age groupings are being required of all licensed programs in most states. QRIS mandates that a differentiated ranking of programs be shared with the public, and the trend is toward mandatory participation in more and more states.

These grants require that programs align an "evidenced-based curriculum with state early learning standards, and that they include "essential domains of readiness" for kindergarten, an upgrade in teacher qualifications- meaning a bachelor's degree in early childhood education or a state approved alternative pathway, required professional development, salaries comparable to those of public school teachers; services for special populations such as children with learning differences, or English learners; cultural sensitivity, including provisions for home language, in providing for parent education, and engagement; student assessment (yes, in pre-school) which improves and informs instruction but which also tracks school readiness and prolonged gains through third grade; providing comprehensive services such as screenings and referrals when needed; and all of this to have ongoing monitoring through a state TQRIS that rates environment, teacher-child interactions, alignment with learning standards, and shares a rating with the public and parents looking for high quality programs with the convenience of  number of stars.

For more on this grant, look at Policy Initiatives on this site.

As always, we welcome and appreciate your comments.

Montessori Forward- C. Lowry