In the heart of one of the poorest neighborhoods in Oklahoma City, in a state-of-the-art facility beside the railroad tracks, the smell of fresh-baked bread and cookies wafts down the halls, which wind around the building to simulate streets in a town.

This is Educare, a premiere early childhood education and child care program, and Oklahoma City is one of only a handful of cities to claim one. In fact, at the time OKC Educare opened this summer, Oklahoma was the only state to have two Educare centers. (Tulsa’s opened in 2006.) Read the rest of this entry »

All appearances to the contrary, we hate bad news as much as anyone. It’s just that these days, selecting topics to blog on typically leaves us with a choice between the bad (the budget) and the ugly (the economy) (or is it the other way around?). Therefore, it truly is a pleasure to call attention to the good, in the form of two recent reports that shine a spotlight on an area where Oklahoma truly excelled: investing in early childhood care and education.

In March, the National Child Care Resource and Referral Association issued a report evaluating the 50 states, along with the District of Columbia and the U.S. Department of Defense, on regulation and oversight of child care facilities based on 15 benchmarks. Oklahoma was ranked third in the nation (tied with Tennessee), earning an overall score of 71 percent.  The state won high marks for frequency of inspections, health and safety training of staff, and parental involvement, but was found lacking in credentialing of lead teachers and background check procedures. Oklahoma is the only state in the country that requires three monitoring visits per year for each child care facility.

The child care report was followed by the annual Pre-School Yearbook report issued by the National Institute for Early Education Research. Once again, Oklahoma’s efforts to provide broad-based, high-quality instruction to 4-year old children have earned the state national acclaim.

Read the rest of this entry »