Education

ZERO TO THREE Western Office News March 13, 2012  Babies in the California Budget Investing in California’s Babies Means Investing in the Future Eighty-five percent of the brain is developed by the age of 3 and there is solid research that access to high quality early learning experience can positively impact infants’ cognitive development. Early learning experiences provide our most vulnerable children a strong educational foundation that prepares them for elementary school while freeing their parents to work with peace of mind. While science has clearly established that learning begins at birth, the Governor’s proposed budget cuts target our most vulnerable infants, toddlers, preschoolers and families. Hearings are currently underway by the California’s Legislature on the Administration’s proposed budget. The Administration’s proposal includes a $517 million cut to early care and education, which would deny 62,000 children, including infants, toddlers and preschoolers, access to the educational foundation that is critical to their life—long success. This comes on top of more than $1 billion in funding cuts to these programs since 2008. The Administration has also proposed restructuring how these programs are provided—likely to result in more children losing access to quality early learning programs.  Click here for more details on

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Are you looking for a good place to volunteer and help children develop a love for books and reading?  Our neighbor to the north offers just the thing.  For 15 years, volunteers like me have been reading to kindergarten and first and second grade students, one-on-one, in Richmond elementary schools—six of them at present count.  Teachers select the students who participate.  We readers meet with two students once a week for half-hour sessions right through the school year.  Every two weeks, the students get a gift book of their choosing, the building blocks for personal libraries. The program is simplicity itself: a caring adult reads to a young person and they talk about what’s read and what the reading suggests to them about the world.  You don’t have to be an expert to do it, just an enthusiastic book and reading person yourself.  And don’t think of it as just feel-good work—although you certainly will be doing something worth feeling good about.  It’s also great fun, and, for me, brought back memories of reading to my own daughters.  I’m glad Marilyn Nye, my one-time colleague at Cal State East Bay, who created the program, talked me into joining the cadre

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  I’ve been taking courses and attending lectures for seniors offered by Cal State East Bay’s OLLI (Osher Life-Long Learning Institute) for several years.  It’s been a mind expanding experience and great fun.  OLLI offers lectures (free to members), courses (usually four weeks in length and reasonably priced), and a variety of field trips. History, science, and literature are my own favorite topics, but the range of subjects offered is broad and the skills of the presenters impressive.  OLLI offers this rich trove at seven sites.  The two closest to Emeryville are the Lake Park Retirement Residence in Oakland and the Mastick Senior Center in Alameda.  The Baywood Retirement Residence in Castro Valley, the Danville Town Meeting Hall, the Reutlinger Community for Jewish Living, and Rossmoor in Walnut Creek aren’t all that far away.  The events at Cal State East Bay’s Concord Campus are a bit of a stretch for us but still inviting given the varied mix of offerings there.  If you would like to know more about OLLI, call 925-602-6776 or e-mail Kathleen Bryant, the Program Coordinator at kathleen.bryant@csueastbay.edu.  OLLI is also on line at www.scholarolli.com.  Give OLLI a try: no homework, no tests, no papers to write

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