The folks at Preschool California, as well as members of the California Legislature, acknowledge that the Golden State isn’t quite so golden
when it comes to the quality of its public preschools. The advocacy group’s Deborah Kong points out that the state now meets five of 10 quality benchmarks, because the state adopted learning standards earlier this year. She also notes that pending legislation would establish a commission to explore ways to improve quality and “consolidate and streamline” state and federally funded programs to set the stage for quality improvement.

Demonstrating the effect of the NIEER reports, the legislation quotes the NIEER finding that the state only meets four of 10 quality standards and cites that as a reason to seek quality improvements. The legislation also notes, however, that the state is in a budget crisis and any improvements can’t increase costs. Indeed, with the state facing a multi-billion-dollar budget deficit, Gov. Schwarzenegger has ordered up an across the board 10% cut in spending.