"Not in school, children pay price with lack of learning"
Thousands of children from low-income families in Wisconsin are being kept out of kindergarten every year, and the state's subsidized child-care program is a driving factor, turning kids into valuable commodities, an investigation by the Journal Sentinel has found.
The $350 million Wisconsin Shares program lets parents keep their 4-, 5- and even some 6-year-olds in day care centers all day - at taxpayer expense - rather than enroll them in accredited kindergarten programs.
In some cases, unscrupulous parents are participating in an easy scam. They sign up their children with friends or relatives who provide child care. The state then pays the providers roughly $200 a week, and providers give parents a kickback.
In other cases, child-care providers offer free gas, free rent, vacation getaways, $1,000 rebates and other incentives to encourage parents to enroll their children in day care rather than school.
The lax rules are not only a blow to taxpayers, but to the state's neediest children who often wind up in loosely regulated environments where little learning takes place. Day care providers aren't required to meet the standards of teachers, nor are they accountable for what children learn.
Indeed, some children show up for first grade not even knowing their full names or how to hold a pencil, said Ann Terrell, director of curriculum and instruction for pre-kindergarten through fifth grade with Milwaukee Public Schools. Clearly, they have not attended a