By Gari Voss
The budget signed by Governor Gretchen Whitmer may have been lauded by some, but the early childhood programs across Michigan took a huge hit. All of the funding for the Great Start Collaborative programs were cut. Translated, $19.4 million dollars will no longer be available to support giving Allegan’s four-year-olds an opportunity to develop skills necessary to succeed in kindergarten and beyond.
William Brown, superintendent of the Allegan Area Educational Service Agency (AAESA), may have put it most succinctly, “To say that I’m disappointed is an understatement.”
Allegan’s ESA served over 2,000 families during the 2024-25 school Year. With no funding the program for 2025-26 is lost. Brown listed what that means. There will no longer be:
A central hub for coordinating referrals, planning, and collaboration among service providers.
Infrastructure that supports early literacy efforts, free book distribution, and early literacy training.
A number of community events.
A support network for childcare providers, coordination of professional training, free educational resources, and more.
“It feels, to be very honest, somewhat hypocritical,” Brown said. “We hear a lot about ‘This is an early childhood state; we need pre-K for all.’ This [program] helps students get ready for kindergarten, so actions are not aligned to what we’re being told.”
With declining reading and math scores across the state, Brown feels that the cutting of the Great Start Collaborative funds will just compound the downward trend. The families who will be most affected will be the underserved who are traditionally lower income, indigenous, and/or bilingual.
Allegan County was a trailblazer in early childhood education. Even before the Great Start Collaborative began as the Michigan School Readiness Program (MSRP) in 1985, Allegan County schools were working with Head Start programs and for profit preschool programs to locate at-risk 4-year-olds and prepare them for kindergarten. This required collaboration to ensure that not only the lowest economic status children received preschool opportunities through Head Start, but all children received a classroom experience.
The focus included developing cognitive, social, and emotional skills through hands-on activities. In the beginning each school district requested funds and began the licensing process to furnish classrooms with trained staff and appropriate materials to ensure a high quality curriculum. That curriculum was ranked #1 in the United States and enabled children to develop social, emotional and academic skills that would have been missing if they had stayed at home.
When the program transitioned to the Great Start Collaborative, all 4-year-olds, no matter economic status, were included in the program. School districts began working together and still collaborating with Head Start to provide classrooms for all 4-year-olds in the county.
When Brown referred to the withholding of funds being “hypocritical”, the reference was to the outcomes prescribed by the Michigan Department of Lifelong Education, Advancement, and Potential’s Office of Early Childhood Education:
Outcome 1: Children are born healthy.
Outcome 2: Children are healthy, thriving, and developmentally on track from birth to third grade.
Outcome 3: Children are developmentally ready to succeed in school at the time of school entry.
Outcome 4: Children are prepared to succeed in fourth grade and beyond by reading proficiently by the end of third grade.
The Great Start Collaboratives included all stakeholders – parents, caregivers, community leaders, and organizations invested in early childhood development. By working together, barriers were identified so programs could be focused on the needs of children and families in each area.
All of those efforts are now unfunded. There are no longer pre-K programs for all. Families will again be vying for Head Start slots with many being left at home either because of a lack of funds to pay for preschool programs or because programs are not available locally meaning transportation is required.
Brown explained that there will be severe cuts with three staff members being laid off and 52 parents being informed that the 4-year-old program is no longer available. The coming weeks will reveal the full affect of the state leadership’s decision.
