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INSIDETUCSONBUSINESS.COM
DEC 3, 2021
Pima County now offering scholarships for early childhood education Alex Pere
Inside Tucson Business
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arents who are looking for help in paying for childcare can now apply for Pima County’s new Pima Early Education Program scholarships. The PEEPs program is designed to expand the availability of high-quality preschool to eligible families. In spring 2021, the Pima County Board of Supervisors approved funding for the PEEPs program, drawing funding from the American Rescue Plan Act. Other local jurisdictions, including Tucson, Marana, Oro Valley and several local school districts also kicked in to help fund the program and the county can draw from the Library District for additional dollars. All told, over the course of three years, the county expects to spend $30 million on PEEPs. PEEP scholarships are reserved for high-quality preschools and households with an annual income of at or below 200% of the federal poverty level. A family of four with a household income of $53,000 is eligible to apply for PEEP scholarships. This is slightly higher than the median 2019 household income of Tucson. According to U.S. census data, Tucson’s median household income is $43,425. High-quality preschools are rated through the Qual-
ity First program run by First Things First, a state agency focused on early childhood education funded by a portion of Arizona’s tobacco tax. Quality First rates early education programs with a five-star rating system. A three- to five-star rating is considered high quality. Ratings are based on key components found in quality early childhood program research: health and safety practices; skilled teachers; learning environments (materials and activities); opportunities for active play and hands-on exploration; teacher-child interactions and engaging conversations. Programs are reevaluated every one to two years. High standards can come with higher tuition rates as teachers with higher education degrees are paid more at early childhood programs and smaller classes require more teachers. Those higher price tags leave many lower-income families unable to attend such facilities, although the Arizona Department of Economic Security provides scholarships to some lower-income families. PEEPs Program Manager Nicole Scott said the Arizona Department of Economic Security’s eligibility for child care benefits is at 165% of the federal poverty line, “so it’s fairly low and there’s a lot of stipulations that are attached to it. The goal behind (PEEPs) was to increase access to families within Pima County.”
Courtesy photo
Early education and childcare for most families can cost more than in-state college tuition. The average cost of infant care in Arizona is $10,948, according to the Economic Policy Institute. This is a financial burden on all parents, but lower-income families are especially affected. “That is actually why my youngest son didn’t attend until he was two and a half because I was literally working to pay for child care,” Scott said. Scott has four children and couldn’t afford to pay for her son’s childcare on her educator’s salary. She said she can see a difference in her son’s development compared to her other children. PEEPs has a website with ample information on scholarships, but Scott advises residents to visit the Childcare Resource and Referral website, funded by DES. “They have this large database across the state of
early childhood providers, all of their information, hours of operation, comments, reviews, and if they have scholarships,” Scott said. “We encourage families to call them because they will direct them to schools within their area that will help fill their needs.” The PEEPs program was born out of a previous campaign for free preschool education called Strong Start. Strong Start Tucson was an unsuccessful ballot initiative more than four years ago that proposed to enact a sales tax to pay for early childhood education. Penelope Jacks was the chair of the Strong Start Tucson initiative campaign committee and said they were surprised by the outcome. Jacks is a retired lawyer and worked for the child advocacy group Children’s Action Alliance for more than 20 years. Jacks is the current co-chair of the Preschool Promise, a preschool advocacy group.
“When I retired, I swore I would not do for free what I used to do for money, about a week later I am doing for free what I used to do for money,” Jacks said. After the campaign, Jacks and Strong Start campaign manager Kelly Griffith met with people who had opposed the ballot initiative. One of the objections to Strong Start was its specific focus on Tucson. Nay-sayers wanted it to reach more children in Pima County. Jacks said they asked the Pima County Board of Supervisors to create high-quality early education scholarships. Jacks found willing board members after the election of Supervisors Adelita Grijalva, Matt Heinz and Rex Scott. (No relation to PEEPs program manager Nicole Scott.) “Rex Scott had been an educator all his life,” Jacks said. “Long before he was running, we had been talking about early child-
hood education and he was really the person out in front who presented it to the Board of Supervisors.” Rex Scott, a former administrator in several local school districts whose wife teaches kindergarten through third grade, said the biggest barrier to early education is household income, even though research shows early education significantly improves the lives of children as they develop. “When they’re 3 or 4 years old, they are not only at a unique stage of brain development, but we’re also concerned with their literacy skills, their interpersonal development, their ability to interact with their peers, and kindergarten readiness,” Rex Scott said. Rex Scott is referencing the mountain of early education research published in the last two decades. Nobel Memorial Prize Winner in Economics Professor James Heckman has compiled groundbreaking research into the economic and societal benefits of high-quality early education. According to Heckman’s research, high-quality early education positively encourages social skills and cognitive skills while also lowering crime rates and increasing later-in-life income. The Heckman curve shows more investment in early education has a higher rate of economic return than later-in-life education. ITB
