Partnerships in Public Pre-Kindergarten: Implications for Teachers

• In Event: 16.060 - Roundtable Session 3
  In Roundtable Session: 16.060-12 - Early Childhood Teachers' Professional Development

Abstract

Abstract
As state-funded preK has expanded, preK partnerships between school districts and early childhood education (ECE) providers have been promoted because of their benefits for districts, ECE providers, and families. Framed by scholarship in the anthropology of policy, this paper examines the implications of a preK partnership for three teachers in Lakeville, Wisconsin. Though they all possessed the same qualifications, because these teachers worked in very different types of settings—a public elementary school, a private preschool, and a corporate childcare center—they experienced the partnership differently. Although the preK program elevated the status of ECE somewhat, by linking it to the K-12 system, each focal teacher was marginalized in some way as the new program intersected with her institutional context.

Author

• Bethany Wilinski, Michigan State University