ATLANTA, GA – Georgia’s Pre-K Program has begun registration for the 2014-2015 school year. Each Georgia Pre-K provider is responsible for setting registration dates, so it is necessary to check directly with Pre-K providers to learn when and how to register. Children who will be four years old on or before September 1 are eligible to enroll.
Programs are offered at local public schools or through private providers of preschool services. Since participation in Georgia’s Pre-K Program is voluntary for public schools and child care providers, space is limited for all four-year-olds to participate.
Georgia’s Pre-K Program is a lottery-funded educational program for all age-eligible four-year-old children in Georgia. Georgia’s Pre-K Programs normally operate on the regular school system calendar for the length of a typical school day. This year, approximately 84,000 four-year-olds are being served through Georgia’s Pre-K Program in over 3,800 funded classes. The purpose of the program is to prepare children for success in Kindergarten and later school years.
“Researchers at the FPG Child Development Institute at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill recently measured Georgia’s Pre-K Program for child outcomes and classroom quality and identified areas of strengths and challenges,” said Bobby Cagle, Commissioner of Bright from the Start: Georgia Department of Early Care and Learning. “Children in the program, on average, showed significant gains in language, math, and behavioral skills. And a second phase of the evaluation confirmed that children are entering kindergarten ready to succeed and excel. We have outstanding teachers who are looking forward to meeting your children next fall.”
Cagle said he is also proud of the newly revised Georgia Early Learning and Development Standards (GELDS) for children from birth to age five. Researchers agree that learning through play, or experiential learning, is the best way to teach children from birth to age five.
For more information on enrolling in Georgia’s Pre-K Program, please visit http://decal.ga.gov/BftS/
Source: Press Release
