2015考研英语阅读学前教育经费_大学英语阅读

2015考研英语阅读学前教育经费

　　Arne Duncan, the education secretary, understands that states are watching every penny. Tightening budgets is the new normal, he admits, but there are smart ways to cut and they are dumb ways to cut. Cutting early education, he reckons, is one of the dumb ones. Mr Duncan is, in fact, making early education one of his priorities, by including it in the next round of funding for Race to the Top, the big federal programme for schools.

　　作为教育部长的阿恩?邓肯，理解各州都掂量着每一分钱。他承认，压缩预算是条新标准，但也有聪明的办法来削减预算，他们用的都是愚蠢的方法。他认为，缩短学前教育是众多愚蠢行为之一。事实上，邓肯先生把学前教育作为他的首要工作之一，包括把它加入到下一轮的给力争上游拨款的范围中。力争上游是针对学校的联邦大项目。

　　Ten states do not provide any funding at all for preschoolers, and some appear to fund it only haphazardly. In Florida preschool programmes are available to all 4-year olds. The problem there is not quantity, but quality. Some programmesand not just in Floridaare nothing more than glorified baby-sitting. The report encourages states to set and stick to standards so that children are prepared for kindergarten at five. But more financial woe could be on the way. Congress is considering a Republican proposal to cut Head Start, a federal preschool funding programme for poor families. Chester Finn of the Thomas Fordham Institute, an education think-tank, is no fan of universal preschool. He thinks it makes more sense to focus the limited resources available on intensive programmes for the neediest children.