Daily Outtakes: More ready fo kindergarten

Yesterday, the Florida Department of Education released the Kindergarten Readiness scores for this past fall. Escambia County increased by 4.5%, with 49.5% of the incoming kindergarten students ready for school, up from 45.1% in the fall of 2022.

• Escambia is only 1.7 percentage points below the statewide average of 51.2%. Santa Rosa County dropped two points but is well above the state average, with 59.2% ready for kindergarten.

A key to Escambia County’s success appears to be having more students in the Voluntary Pre-Kindergarten program. The VPK students outperformed other kindergarteners – 60.2% to 35.5%. Escambia County had 97 more VPK students score well on the screening.

In an email to Early Learning Coalition executive directors, Cari Miller, Chancellor of Early Learning for Florida, wrote, “The results prove that students who participate in Florida’s VPK program are more likely to enter kindergarten prepared for school.”

• • • It should be noted that Escambia VPK students are doing as well as the state average of 63.5%.

Dig Deeper: The community needs to do a deep dive into how we achieved this improvement. Maybe the University of West Florida will do the research. I believe the Studer Community Institute’s Early Brain Development initiative may be a significant factor.

In May 2018, SCI completed its first year working with all three area hospitals. Babies born in 2018 started kindergarten last fall.

Fall Kindergarten Readiness Scores:
2018: 45%
2019: 46%
2020: 47%
2021: 42%
2022: 45%
2023: 50%

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