Feeling the pinch of budget cuts
Becker: Education cuts will hurt
PRINCETON — People with disabilities and victims of domestic violence, those needing addiction treatment and all of those who care for them are focused on Springfield this week, as legislators returned Tuesday to try and work out a path out of the budget morass.
Illinois faces the largest budget deficit in its history, about $9.2 billion, and Gov. Pat Quinn and lawmakers are wrangling over a way to fix the problem before the current budget expires Tuesday. Without a tax increase, Quinn says the only option is drastic cuts to social service programs.
One person watching the proceedings with keen interest is Janet Becker, director of early childhood for Princeton Elementary School District.
“If the legislators restore some of the funds, the Illinois State Board of Education will need to either choose which programs to fund, or to fund all of the programs, but at a much lower rate,” she said. “If there are no funds to provide programs, there will be no programs.”
Becker’s concern is about the district’s Bright Beginnings prekindergarten program, and the Early Beginnings program for children from birth to age 3. For 20 years, those programs have been entirely funded by an Illinois State Board of Education Early Childhood Block Grant, which amounted to almost $700,000 for the 2008-09 school year. Currently the ISBE has $900 million worth of programs that remain unfunded, including the $380 million for the early childhood block grant.
“It’s going to be impossible for Illinois lawmakers to cut one-third of the state’s budget without cutting education, health care, social services and services that are also important to us,” Becker said.
Becker said the Bright Beginnings and Early Beginnings programs, which are in jeopardy of being reduced or eliminated, provide a valuable service to area children and families.
“In the Bright Beginnings program, we service 180 children every year,” she said. “We have 120 that are housed at Douglas School; we have 40 that are housed at Zearing Child Enrichment Center; and 20 housed at Learning Ladder Early Childhood Center.”
Becker said that program means children are receiving prekindergarten programming to ensure they are ready for kindergarten.
“Every year, the standards get higher and higher for children to come into kindergarten,” she said. “Those expectations increase every year, and without proper preparation, these children are going to go into kindergarten unprepared and under a disadvantage.”
The program for the younger children is also important because it provides parenting support services for about 135 families.
“It’s during those first five years that the brain development is the most important and happens the quickest,” Becker said. “It’s important that these families are prepared to be their children’s first and best teachers.”
Becker said cutting the funding would be short-sighted.
“Research shows that for every dollar put into early childhood, there is a savings of $7 down the road in other services that may need to be provided,” she said. “If you look at it that way, early childhood programs are a bargain for this state, and especially during a time of fiscal crisis.”
Becker said she definitely supports cutting waste out of the budget.
“But services providing education to children and families are never, ever going to be a waste,” she said.
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