Can Kansas City become the best in kindergarten readiness?

Kansas City’s business community is promising a sustained campaign to prepare young children throughout the region to succeed in kindergarten. It’s the right focus, but one that brings a set of challenges.

The Greater Kansas City Chamber of Commerce announced Wednesday it is adding kindergarten readiness to its “Big 5” portfolio. That campaign began in 2011 as a way to concentrate on efforts with the potential to boost the area’s economy and quality of life.

Ample research supports the premise that investing in early childhood education helps children succeed throughout their school years and results in a smarter, better-prepared work force.

But how to best invest on a regionwide basis raises questions about financing, turf, access and belief systems.

Universal preschool, the most commonly cited tool for kindergarten preparedness, is expensive. Getting states to invest is difficult.

Providers and parents have different ideas about what works. Not all parents are willing to entrust their children to someone outside their homes. Children in low-income families, who reap the biggest gains from quality early education, are often the last to receive access.

But there is general agreement that exposure to books, field trips and other positive experiences helps young children build vocabulary and social skills. Surely there are ways to connect children to those kinds of opportunities.

The business community’s commitment to its new mission is reflected in its choice of leaders. Former mayors Kay Barnes of Kansas City and Carol Marinovich of Kansas City, Kan., have agreed to coordinate the initiative, as has Tracy McFerrin Foster, vice president and secretary of the Hall Family Foundation.

Barnes and Marinovich are skilled at encouraging collaboration, which will be essential to the project’s success. Foster brings expertise and a knowledge of funding sources.

The first step, Barnes said, will be to take an inventory of assets and programs already in place, and gauge what more is needed. New ideas are likely to bubble up from that process.

The latest “Big 5” was announced at a lunch crowded with educators. If it succeeds in boosting kindergarten preparedness in a big way, it could fundamentally alter this region.

This story was originally published September 24, 2014 at 5:07 PM with the headline "Can Kansas City become the best in kindergarten readiness?."