After the Macon County Board of Education approved to send a $8.6 million proposal, which included a $5 million request for two additional pre-k classrooms, to the county board of commissioners, the BOC got to hear a presentation from the Advancing Highlands Education Committee about why the need for pre-k in Highlands is necessary.
AHEC member Allison Tate who runs the Gordon Center in Highlands reiterated the needs for pre-k in the community.
“I’m here to give my perspective from a childhood care provider,” Tate said. “I have been teaching the half-day pre-k program at the United Methodist Church for 13 years now. In our community in Highlands, we are facing desperate needs for childcare. We currently have two licensed facilities, the Gordon Center and the Highlands Community Child Development Center. Between our two centers, we easily have more than 50 children who are on the waitlist for a spot. I know that the Gordon center itself currently has 39 children on the waitlist and we are only licensed for 21 children. There are currently four babies on the waitlist that haven’t even been born yet.”
With Macon County currently having five N.C. State Pre-K classrooms, Highlands does not have any. Tate said if there were a pre-k class at Highlands School, it would alleviate some of the pressure from the two childcare facilities.
“Currently, there are 18 children in the preschool classroom at HCCDC and 15 children in my classroom. For example, if these children had been serviced through an N.C. Pre-K program at Highlands School, our childcare facilities could have filled these 23 spots with young children. Pat Hedden, the director at HCCDC, told me that if there were a pre-k class at Highlands School, she could completely fill her vacant classrooms right now. I fully agree with her. The question is where are these children that are not able to be serviced by our facilities? It might mean that a parent is not able to work or the child is being shuffled around by grandparents or various sitters. The child may be at places that are not licensed or regulated by the state. None of these scenarios are ideal for the complete social, emotional and academic development of a young child.”
For Fall 2022, Tate said they need 11 pre-k spots, 17 pre-k spots for Fall 2023, 11 pre-k spots for Fall 2024. There are currently 11 children on the waitlist for Fall 2025 that are not old enough to attend the center and four children for Fall 2026 that are not born yet.
With Tate set to retire in May, she said that Highlands may lose another childcare center, which increases the need for pre-k at Highlands School.
“Though we have been trying for two years, we have not been able to secure a certified teacher to take over the program,” Tate said. “I have interviewed three certified teachers, but they all need the benefits provided by the state. What’s more important is that these students need a certified teacher and they deserve the best pre-k education we can provide.”
Fourth grade teacher at Highlands School, Maci Bears, said that her child is one of the lucky few that get to experience quality childcare in the community.
“There are many who do not have that ability,” Bears said. “As a teacher at Highlands School and the mom of a preschool aged child, I really can’t overemphasize the importance of quality public preschool in the Highlands area. Providing students, regardless of socioeconomic status, regardless of if they got on the waiting list five years in advance, everybody should have a chance to develop those fundamentals of reading and writing.”
Bears said learning those fundamentals at ages three and four benefits the child and having preschool in Highlands bridges the gap in learning.
“Studies show that if you get children in an early childhood education program, it reduces the need for special education by 39 percent by the third grade,” Bears said. “Special education costs nearly twice as much as regular classes. While a preschool would serve the entire community, it would be especially beneficial for our English language learner population. Having children immersed in a new language at an early age supports their oral development, which leads to higher reading ability in the future. Unfortunately, according to the 2021 NCDPI data, 621.6 percent of English language learners placed at a level one out of five on the grade three reading EOG last year. These children deserve an opportunity to become efficient readers and that begins in preschool.”
Over the last few weeks, Bears said she has learned some alarming statistics from a developmental course she is taking that emphasizes the power of reading.
“The window for students to become successful readers is very small,” Bears said. “In fact, unless students learn to read proficiently at the end of the first grade they are highly likely to remain poor readers for the rest of their lives and suffer academic difficulties in school. So, at the current rate of coming in at Kindergarten, that gives our teachers two years to make these gains or they are at a very high risk of never reading successfully. The addition of a preschool program would give teachers another one or two years to begin those basics of language development.”
Though Bears said as a teacher she is more likely to lean towards the benefits associated around reading, she said there are several other benefits that come out of having a preschool at Highlands School.
“Children who attend preschool are proven to be more successful at socializing, regulating emotions, interacting with others, and gaining confidence,” Bears said. “Children who go to preschool are more likely to be employed, own a house and have a savings account. Preschool is crucial in the foundation of a child’s life and the entire community will reap its benefits in the future. It is time for all our Highlands community children to have access to that quality early childhood education.”
Old Edwards Inn President Richard Delany said since his business is one of the largest employers in the community, with almost 500 employees, he was at the meeting to give a business perspective.
“When I started here, almost 14 years ago, we had maybe 150 employees,” Delany said. “We now have well over 500 employees at Old Edwards. Many of our employees live in Macon County, in between Franklin and Highlands. Unfortunately, the growth of early childhood education in the county and Highlands has not grown along with the growth in our numbers. We are seeing an effect. We do have a lot of our families at the Gordon Center and HCCDC on scholarships to help them with this, and we do have employee surveys and it has now become one of the number one concerns of our employees about their children’s futures and where these children will get this education.”
Delany has four grandchildren between the ages of six months and four years old, three of which at the Gordon Center.
“That is going to change if we don’t get more volume,” Delany said. “With a waitlist of one to three years, it is a problem that is going to continue to build. We have employees that have children on waitlists for literally a year or two years to get into one of these places. It is so much easier and efficient for our employees from Franklin to come up here to attend these daycares in Highlands versus trying to find some place down there.”
With employees coming daily with concerns to Delany, he said he doesn’t know what to tell them.
“Our employees don’t know where to turn,” Delany said. “They come to us daily and we don’t have an answer for them. There are so many great families that need help. If you look at a business aspect, recruiting employees is becoming harder and harder. We have families coming from instate and out of state looking to Macon County for a place to set up home and live and it is very hard. One of the first questions they ask is educational opportunities and at this point in time we don’t have great responses because we don’t have options for them. We are at a disadvantage in so many ways. It would be a huge benefit for the residents of Macon County and the employees of Macon County if we could have a pre-k in Highlands where these children could learn at an early age.”
Jeff Weller with AHEC rounded out the meeting giving a presentation from Novus Architects, an architecture and design firm out of Asheville, on the planning study they did on Highlands School.
In the planning study, Novus outlined several objectives including providing pre-K services on campus, integrating project based learning curriculum and enhancements to CTE curriculum.
According to the planning study, space needs at Highlands School are two pre-K classrooms at 1,200 square feet each, 36 students and a playground that is 2,700 square feet. For project based learning and career technical education, the planning study found that there needs to be labs/maker’s spaces added to the elementary, middle and high schools at 1,200 to 2,000 square feet each, more square feet in the media center and independent learning areas.
For the new pre-K classrooms, it will be integrated into the elementary wing with long-term enrollment flexibility and proximity to existing plumbing. There will be an adjacent playground area that is fenced in and landscaped/screened from car traffic.
For project based learning, the plan says the media center needs to be expanded to incorporate independent work areas, flexible furnishings, project based learning support, elementary literacy and an outdoor learning area that is fenced in and landscaped/screened from car traffic. The maker’s spaces will be an access for pre-K through 12 grade, and have flexibility for varied activities. Roll-up doors will be used for an outdoor learning area and these outdoor learning areas will be expanded.
The new construction for 3,500 square feet would cost approximately $1,225,000. Renovations for 12,000 square feet would cost $1,875,000. An outdoor playground/learning area would cost $100,000 and contingency and yearly escalation at 10 and eight percent respectively, would cost $320,000 and $256,000 for a total $3,500,000.
With added on design fees, survey, testing, furniture, fixtures, equipment and technology, the studies project total cost is $4,400,000.
Commissioner Joshua Young asked Weller why the school board didn’t pay the $35,000 for the planning study, and Weller responded by saying AHEC loves Highlands and wants to make sure their kids can return to Highlands.
“Our group is made up of eight members and we all love Highlands,” Weller said. “I have two children that both graduated from Highlands School. I want their kids, eventually if they choose to, to do the same. That’s why we wanted to do this. We weren’t going to walk in here high in the sky and say, ‘We want this much money,’ without having the basis of how we got here. We all felt like this was the only way to kick this ball further down the road.”
The $5 million request is included in the school board’s $8.6 million request to the board of commissioners, which will be considered in the next budget.
“This is one of my budget priorities,” Board of Commissioners Chairman Jim Tate said. “I hope we get this project off the ground and help one of our primary economic drivers in this county, from a tax base standpoint. I hope this project will come to fruition.”
- By Christopher Lugo