Parents begin to worry before enrollment. The common opinion is that there are not enough places. A rumor is circulating that children get into kindergartens through connections or because their parents can afford it. Giving in to conspiracy theories and wanting to be safe, parents apply for places at all the kindergartens.
Krystyna Boratyńska, head of the Social Affairs Department, assures everyone that places will be found for all children. In 2008, 140 children were not admitted to kindergartens during the first qualification round. Recruitment continued throughout the year, however, and that number fell to 14. This year, 98 children were not admitted, but recruitment for kindergartens has not closed. Places are still being sought for those who were not accepted the first time. Krystyna Boratyńska continues to receive parents submitting appeals and calls those who were not admitted to their chosen kindergarten but received a place at another one. She asks whether they accept the offer and, depending on their decision, transfers the child to another institution.
Who had the least chance?
The largest number of children not admitted were four-year-olds, followed by three-year-olds. All six-year-olds and five-year-olds were admitted, as was one group of three-year-olds at each kindergarten.
The mandatory admission of five-year-olds was one of the priority enrollment criteria, because the education reform being introduced will make kindergarten attendance compulsory for five-year-olds in 2011.
The next criterion was the employment status of both parents. “This year, the main reason why a child was not admitted to kindergarten was that one of the parents was unemployed,” informs Krystyna Boratyńska.
Should the city build an additional kindergarten?
Krystyna Boratyńska presents the situation clearly. She is open to the market and to private investors. Three private kindergartens are already opening in the city. If their operations are officially registered by September this year, from January 1, 2010, they will receive 70% of the average subsidy allocated to kindergartens. “Private kindergartens offer children very interesting programs, foreign-language lessons and other extracurricular activities included in the price. New kindergartens will certainly have to earn their popularity, but once they gain a reputation and parents begin sending their children there, the number of children in public kindergartens will start to decline. I would not want to later close a kindergarten that we had built at great expense,” explains Krystyna Boratyńska.
Who is responsible for the lack of places in kindergartens?
Mainly the inconsistent and poor education policy of the state. “None of the education regulations, including the Act on the Education System in Poland, says that a young child must have a place in a kindergarten,” Mariola Bakalarz, the head of Municipal Kindergarten No. 1, tells the IstotneInformacje.pl portal.
Parents do not want to understand that kindergartens are subject to certain conditions and to the education law. No more than 25 children can be admitted to a kindergarten group, under threat of violating the regulations. In addition, when the law says that a five-year-old has the right to be admitted to kindergarten this year, it becomes an obligation for the kindergarten. They must accommodate the amendment that gives current five-year-olds the opportunity to begin school in 2010 with their parents’ consent.
Because of these regulations, the plans of many kindergarten directors came to nothing. Aware of how many three-year-olds had not been admitted the previous year, the directors had planned to create additional groups for four-year-olds this year. However, the number of five- and six-year-olds registered for kindergartens meant that there were not enough places for four- and three-year-olds. In addition, priority was given to admitting siblings of children already attending kindergarten, in order to help parents. They did not want to create a situation in which a parent would have to take two children to different kindergartens. As always, single parents have priority as well.
In her personal opinion, Director Bakalarz believes that maintaining seven kindergartens in Bolesławiec is a truly enormous financial effort for the local government. Under a resolution of the City Council, five hours of a child’s daily stay in kindergarten are free for the parent. The parent pays 250 zlotys (5 zlotys for the daily meal allowance and 1.60 zlotys per hour beyond the core curriculum). The city contributes a subsidy of approximately 500 zlotys per child per month. These are substantial sums.
There is also a major disparity between the education policies of governments in Poland, parents’ needs and media coverage of the importance of education for the youngest children. The media increasingly report that attending kindergarten helps raise a child who is open to self-expression and successful in further education. More and more parents are aware of this. Wanting to provide their child with the best possible start, they want to send them to kindergarten as early as possible.
And this is where they collide with the reality prevailing in Polish kindergartens: a lack of places in the first recruitment round, waiting lists for children, uncertainty about whether a child will get a place and the fear that a place can only be obtained through connections.
It is difficult to blame parents for being frustrated and looking for someone responsible for this situation. However, it should be remembered that recruitment is still ongoing. Krystyna Boratyńska and the directors of Bolesławiec’s kindergartens are also fighting on the parents’ side.
(GH report)