Stunning results from community-wide preschool partnership

The entire Bremerton, Washington community is supporting a new program to help students meet grade level standards at the end of third grade. And they are getting the results they aimed for:

• More than 63% of entering kindergarteners know the alphabet, up from 4% when the program began,
• Only 2% of 1^st graders need special educational services down from 12% a few years ago,
• 73% of first graders are reading at grade level, up from 52%,
• Kindergarten students reading at grade level has risen from 1% to 92%,
• 75% of the district’s 3rd graders read on grade level, up from 64% in 20
• Providing $2000 of curriculum materials to community preschools saves $2500 for EVERY kindergartener who does not need remedial learning services.

After seeing these striking results, the Bremerton School Board expanded the program to serve about 800 children. Bremerton employs a mix of strategies including investing in community preschools, adding universal full-day kindergarten, and aligning the pre-K and K-3 curriculum.

Family involvement is a fundamental ingredient in Bremerton’s five-year plan. The building blocks for their successful partnership with families include:

• Developing strong relationships with all preschools in the elementary catchment area, including monthly staff development meetings on weekends and evenings,
• Using community preschools as a pathway to connect with parents of preschool children,
• Co-locating a preschool at every elementary school,
• Providing tools and materials for preschool teachers to share with families.

As a result of strong partnerships with families and programs, activities like “Family Night” at each elementary school are extremely well-attended. Language is the Key is used to show parents how to promote oral language development. According to the project leader, Linda Sullivan-Dudzic, “Language is the Key is wonderful for families and teachers.”

This year Bremerton will focus on building relationships with the community’s most vulnerable families. Sullivan-Dudzic believes the best way to reach families is by working with organizations that already have a relationship with the families. A Washington Reading Corp volunteer will reach out to transitional housing, the Salvation Army Homeless Camp, and faith-based programs. One of Sullivan-Dudzic’s strategies is to use Language is the Key to show families how to use the CAR strategies to promote early language and literacy. During the coming years Bremerton will also focus on math proficiency and social-emotional development using similar, community-wide strategies.

Sullivan-Dudzic and colleagues provide guidance to communities in their book Making a Difference: 10 Essential Steps to Building a PreK-3 System (Linda T. Sullivan-Dudzic,  Donna K. Gearns,  Kelli J. Leavell, 2010, Corwin Press).  The book is a tested and practical guide to increasing achievement by establishing a strong Pre K–3 foundation.

Read more about Bremerton’s model…