State officials are preparing to name a second interim Department of Education commissioner Friday as the search for a permanent leader heads into its seventh month.
Early Childhood Education
Posted inEducation
Lamont names Bye to lead Office of Early Childhood
Gov.-elect Ned Lamont tapped Sen. Beth Bye, D-West Hartford, to lead the state Office of Early Childhood.
Posted inEducation
Looking for child care? Here’s our database of quality benchmarks
Child care inspection reports in Connecticut are public documents, but there’s no useful way to search for them online. So we built one. Although the state does license programs to ensure the facilities and homes are safe for children and staff are equipped to handle emergencies, the state’s online database only provides the date that […]
Posted inEducation
Still no state child care rating system, parents left guessing
Children enrolled at Rhonda Strycharz’s home day care program. When Rhonda Strycharz first opened a day care 18 years ago in her New Hartford home, only a few states had a rating system to help parents choose a child care provider. Connecticut was not among them. By last year, 41 states had a county or state-wide Quality […]
Posted inMoney
Wealthier students benefit from art, music over summer while poor kids miss out
More affluent kids are about twice as likely to visit a museum, art gallery, or historical site or see a play or concert over the summer, as compared with their peers from low-income families. That’s according to a new analysis released this month by the federal government, illustrating disparities in out-of-school experiences, which may be exacerbated by rising income inequality.
Posted inMoney
Parties sharply divided over higher ed, labor costs, transportation
Democrats and Republicans offered sharply contrasting spending plans for the next fiscal year. While they shared some common ground involving municipal aid and health care for the elderly and disabled, major disagreements involving labor costs, higher education and revenue stand in the way of another bipartisan budget agreement.
Posted inMoney
Competing CT budget plans rely on April tax bonanza
Democratic and Republican legislators offered competing visions for the next state budget Friday, but both effectively dipped into this spring’s unexpectedly high income-tax revenues to salvage key programs for towns and social services, drawing a sharp rebuke from Gov. Dannel P. Malloy.
Posted inEducation, Energy & Environment, Health, Money, Politics
House sends veto-proof, bipartisan budget to Malloy
With the final flourish of a veto-proof margin, the House of Representatives voted Thursday to give final legislative passage to an overdue, bipartisan budget crafted without the direct involvement of Gov. Dannel P. Malloy.
Posted inEducation, Health, Money, Politics
After 117-day marathon, Senate passes bipartisan budget
The Senate took a major step early Thursday toward ending Connecticut’s nearly 17-week budget impasse, overwhelmingly adopting a $41.3 billion, two-year plan that closes huge deficits without raising income or sales tax rates, imposes modest cuts on local aid, and provides emergency assistance to keep Hartford out of bankruptcy.
Posted inEconomic Development, Education, Health, Money, Politics
Last night, the budget politics — today, the details
Legislators arrived at the State Capitol on Friday with the opportunity for the first time to see the details of a $41.4 billion, two-year budget proposal that the administration of Gov. Dannel P. Malloy and Democratic legislative leaders hoped would end Connecticut’s summer-long budget impasse.
Posted inEducation
Care4Kids enrollment down 7,500 since closing to new families
Care4Kids, which once helped low-income parents of more than 22,000 children pay for day care so they could work, has reduced its enrollment by one-third, a year after closing to virtually all new applicants.
Posted inEducation, Money
State to continue funding pre-K expansion despite lack of budget
With no state budget in place for the current fiscal year – and the school year quickly approaching – uncertainty had surrounded whether the state would provide the money it promised district leaders when they expanded or opened new preschool classrooms over the last two school years.
Posted inEducation, Money, Politics
House panel cuts education budget, but not nearly as much as Trump
WASHINGTON — House appropriators rejected many of President Donald Trump’s proposed cuts to education, but trimmed some programs and eliminated others – including one that provides the state and local school districts with $25 million in teacher training grants each year. House appropriators also failed to adjust this year’s Pell grant awards for inflation, a move state officials say will cost Connecticut students $6 million in college financial aid next year.
Posted inEducation, Money
Malloy would cut town aid, early childhood education to patch budget hole
The governor, who sent his adjustments to legislative leaders Thursday, also would reduce state contributions to a supplemental retirement health care program for teachers, potentially boosting costs for future retirees.
Posted inEducation
Pre-K boosts future incomes, reduces risk of jail, when schools spend more
It’s an issue that has long puzzled policymakers: Why do some early childhood programs produce big benefits for students, but others don’t? The answer may be linked to what happens after kids leave the programs altogether and move through school.