HeadStart (This program should be moved from Health and Human Services to the Dept. of Education as it’s where a child’s education begins)
- Currently only 22% of pre-school aged children who qualify for Headstart can participate. For infants and toddlers. it’s only 7%. That’s a lot of families left out. There are also a lot of moving pieces within Headstart that need to be addressed.
- Teacher salaries need to be equal to those of elementary school teachers. They are required to have credentials in early childhood education and should be paid accordingly. This will also help ensure our children are ready for Georgia Pre-K which is open to all 4-year-olds.
- Review the guidelines necessary to receive HeadStart funding so that smaller non-profits in more rural areas can bring the program closer to home, eliminating the nearly one hour plus drive some participants face.
- Make HeadStart an essential service to protect it from government shutdowns.
Kindergarten through 12th grade
- Restore the Department of Education
- Amend Title I funding to
- Mandate a percentage be spent on teacher salaries
- Require “educational consultant” spending is maxed at 5% of the total budget
- Increased allocations for districts that create a competitive local wage floor in line with the community’s cost of living
- Live up to our 1975 promise to fund 40% of the additional costs required to assist those with disabilities
- Reconfigure the “Grants for Buses and Bus Facilities” program to focus more on rural areas so that missing the bus doesn’t mean missing the day of school, a factor that largely contributes to high absenteeism in rural districts
- Develop “Learn and Earn” grants that allow students to work during the day at an apprenticeship while earning graduation credit. This gives students more time to study in the evening and on weekends as they aren’t working a job during those hours.
- Expand the Federal E-Rate program to equip all public-school buses with commercial grade wi-fi. The ride home is long in many rural districts. This will allow them to get some work done with traveling and partially address the gap for those who do not have reliable broadband at home.
College/University/Trade/Vocational Schools
- Modernize the Federal Work Study program by shifting the focus away from low-wage campus desk jobs to work based learning and apprenticeships in the student’s field of study.
- Expand the Workforce Pell Grant program to permanently include low-income students the opportunity to train for high skill, in demand jobs (logistics, commercial driver, welder) in months instead of years and graduating with zero student debt.
- Support the “Open Textbooks” program that allows faculty to create, download and distribute Open Educational Resources which are peer-reviewed textbooks that are free to students. This removes over $1000 per year for every student.
- Standardize the transfer of credits for general education courses so that any college or university has to give you credit for that passed course. This eliminates the retaking of classes and extending the student’s time in school as well as removing redundant costs.
- Pass the EATS Act to allow time spent in class to count for the work requirement required for SNAP benefits. Hunger lowers academic success and raises the likelihood of dropping out.
- Update the National Apprenticeship Act so that small and medium sized businesses, not just large corporations, can receive the tax benefits of having “learn and earn” workers on their team.
- Standardize vocational training credentials to establish national standards in fields like advanced manufacturing, cybersecurity, and healthcare so that the credentials are recognized throughout the entire industry, not just for one particular company or program
- Increase focus on the “Youth Registered Apprenticeship” allowing 11th and 12th grade students to work with local unions and private businesses learning the skills they need to exit high school with professional experience and training
- Subsidize "Dual Enrollment programs. This allows high schoolers to take vocational courses at local community colleges for free, graduating with both a high school diploma and an industry-recognized associate degree or certificate.
