In the first four years of California’s new kindergarten system, 167 community kindergartens in Los Angeles County were closed, unable to survive financially with enrollment drops or more expensive child care and UC Berkeley operations.
The closure represents some painful and unintended consequences of the rise of the state of kindergartiven or TK The loss of public Preschools means that some families of children under 4 have had to postpone finding other day care that appeared in the used network.
At least in some cases, rather than strengthening the child care sector and serving more children, TK instead appears to compete with – and replace – domestic children, as they strive to take over from younger children, according to the study. Areas that experienced the greatest growth in TK enrollment were also the most likely to be targeted for church closures.
“TK seemed like a brilliant idea with very few negatives,” said Bruce Feller, UC Berkeley Professor emeritus of education and public policy who led the study. “But at the bottom it was carefully weighed down.”
Join our community-funded journalism as we cover childcare, kindergarten, health and other issues affecting children from Age 5.
In 2019, before the pandemic, there were about 26,500 children enrolled in TK in public schools in the County. Since then, with the help of the state’s expansion of TK, the program has grown to about 39,500 children in the 2024-25 school year, according to state data.
But this increase — about 13,000 students — is slightly outpaced by the loss of 12,000 preschools that closed from 2020 to 2024 versus 92 closings.
And while the pressures from the pandemic and the decline in population have contributed to this increase, the researchers’ statistical analysis found that TK played an important role in driving the closure of these institutions.
Some areas of the County actually experienced a total loss of child care facilities as TK was expanded. In the rolling area on the hill-Palos Verdes Verdes, for example, TK enrollment increased by 152 children, but the area lost four pre-schools to receive 316 children. In the Northridge area, TK enrollment increased by 96 children, but the closing of 3 preschools meant a loss of 184 spaces.
Many of the state’s goals for the TK program – set in 2020 through the Master’s program for early learning and care – include calling for 4-year-old children to pick up 3-year-olds, and children and parents with a significant lack of options. Licensed centers and child care homes in La County alone have the capacity to accommodate 13% of working parents with infants and children of the Department of Health.
But in reality, preschools have struggled to transition to young children amid challenges such as teachers, aging barriers, reluctance of some staff to change diapers, investigators found.
A student at Angelina Preschool in Los Angeles makes her own books.
(Myung J. Chun / Los Angeles Times)
“The good news is that we’re working with children as young as 4 years old. But the not-so-good news is that they’re promoting the power of pre-community activities for children,” Fuller said.
State authorities refused to answer the results of the study, or questions about the impact of the TK program on public districts. TK is worth about $3.7 billion a year and was fully operational this year after its fourth quarter. All four-year-olds in California are now eligible for a free place in a new grade school.
The study revealed another surprising registration method in the County.
Another goal of creating TK aims to reduce income and racial disparities in early childhood cognitive abilities. But TK enrollment growth has been highest in the county’s most affluent zip codes, including Palos Verdes and Brentwood-Westwood. As of 2021, TK enrollment has grown 50% in the County’s poorest quarter of zip codes, but 135% in the richest quarter of zip codes.
Another explanation, Fuller said, may be that many low-income families already have access to free child care in long-standing programs that include head start, the California State Preschool program and vouchers that can be used for various care options.
“People who are more than eligible for the money they had to pay through the nose for high-quality preschool. So the immediate higher economic costs are felt by those middle- and middle-class families who had to pay for preschool,” she said.
Up close: the struggle of a single preschooler
For the past two years, as TK’s expansion has continued, staff at the Angelina Kindergarten in Beaudry, a neighborhood near the city, have been struggling to fill its classrooms.
“The 4-year-olds kept disappearing,” said Jacqueline Torres, administrative director of child development programs at the Tokyo Service Center, which runs the preschool.
In July, Torres was confident that the 10 4-year-old students who attended the previous year would remain at the school. But when United LA started in August, the Six ended up being transferred at the last minute — some went to an elementary school across the street — leaving empty spaces in Angelina’s classroom.
This year, 49 children are enrolled in Angelina – down from a peak of 58 in 2023. “And it’s been a hard fought 49,” Torres said. He has been trying “very hard” to make up for the loss of 4-year-olds by targeting infants and toddlers, but with limited success.
Angelina Preschool is located within an affordable housing complex in Los Angeles. The school, which is part of the smaller Tokyo Service Center, is struggling to maintain enrollment as many parents opt for a convertible kindergarten instead.
(Myung J. Chun / Los Angeles Times)
Another problem, he says, is that the State did not give Community Preschools like HERS “more warning and time” when they started expanding TK. Caring for young children requires preparation, and schools did not have time to make changes before they started losing their older students.
“It put preschool districts and school districts as almost a competitor, where I think TK should have been an alternative,” Torres said.
Taking babies and children
Some preschools have successfully started serving infants and toddlers, and the State has helped increase tuition fees for preschools that care for young children.
However, obstacles persist.
Caring for infants and toddlers requires a special health and safety license from the state, a process that can take 6 to 12 months, said Nina Butehee, executive director of Allchild California, a member organization of the Association of Child Care Centers. There is also a new set of fire regulations for childcare facilities to contend with, she said.
Many pre-school teachers who are not trained or have the desire to take care of children, do work for rent. Infant care is a specialty that “goes down.”
And it is also a difficult financial proposition. Due to scale requirements, one teacher can care for 12 preschool children, but only three infants or four children. The operation of the kindergarten often depends on the collection of collections from 4-year-old legends to support the few losses from the few but illegal children and children in need.
Buhee said he was not surprised by the survey results.
“It takes time to be able to get rid of this. It’s almost like moving the Titanic. You point it in one place, but it takes a little time for the oil to change and all the oil to go with it,” he said. “If it was as easy as flipping a switch, you better believe the programs would be doing it.”
Preschool budgets are tightening
At Segray Preschool, which has locations in Eagle Rock and Thousand Oaks, owner Annette Gladstone said she has a waiting list for infants and toddlers but has had trouble enrolling preschoolers. She wants to work with more young children and has an empty classroom to fill with babies and toddlers – but she says the process is very difficult.
“I’d like to do it, but we just don’t like to go through the process of what the license is for, to be honest,” Gallstone said. So instead, he is more careful with his budget, and pays more attention to spending.
Butee said that as TK continues to grow, it is possible that many Preschools will receive additional numbers. “We haven’t seen the full impact of this. Sometime in the next year or so we’re going to see a lot of programs close.”
When the TK plan passes the Legislature, Puller said, this kind of collateral damage to California’s child care sector may not have their vote.
“It’s a classic case of national policy where policymakers in the government have a simple idea about implementation, but in reality, it’s happening in a very good way.”
This article is part of the Times’ Youth Education issue, which focuses on the learning and development of California children, from infants to 5 years old. For more information about its Philanthropic initiatives, go to Latimes.com/earysed.
