He urged the General Assembly to approve it to enable Indiana s first kindergartners of the new millennium to get the best possible start on their education. The Indiana House of Representatives has approved the governor s plan. But though they campaigned last fall on a platform that included full-day kindergarten, Republicans on the state Senate s Finance Committee last week deleted it from the proposed state budget. O Bannon called on the full Senate to restore full-day kindergarten, saying its focus on early education would do more good for Indiana students than would the Republican alternative, an unstructured block grant program. Indiana is one of only about a dozen states that don t support full-day kindergarten and other readiness programs that prepare children for 1 st grade.
Research shows that early intervention in education pays off for students.
They gain better reading skills and they score better on tests all the way through high school. The Evansville schools, which have been doing full-day kindergarten on their own for more than a decade, have proved it, he pointed out. Optional, full-day kindergarten is something Indiana can afford to do right now, the governor declared. In fact, we can t afford not to do it.