Friday Freakout: Full-day Kindergarten

You might think that since I haven't posted on a Friday (or on any day) in so long that I have nothing to freak out about. Oh, but you would be wrong. I have a million things to freak out about: Jett's graduation from preschool, his 5th birthday, his soccer team, Kai's total disinterest in potty training, his upcoming full-day preschool, their school uniforms, oh the list goes on and I'll post all about it soon. For now though I'm freaking out about kindergarten.

In the fall Jett will start kindergarten at a public school not too far from us. Like most elementary schools in Chicago, they accepted 40 kindergarteners but then were funded for only one teacher. Thus kindergarten is shortened to a half day - one morning class and one afternoon class. This is disappointing for a lot of reasons, mostly because there are so many academic benefits to full-day versus half day kindergarten.

Thankfully there are some energetic kindergarten parents at Jett's school who have started a fundraising campaign to raise the money to hire a second teacher (so there would be two full-day kindergarten classes). We need at least $85,000. The school and the fundraising committee already donated $30,000 to the cause, so the parents of the incoming kindergarteners are left to raise the remaining $55,000 +. The money needs to be raised by June 28th. We found out about this last week. Amazingly for a school with a poverty rate of 83%, we have raised the majority of the money in a week. We still have about $15,000 left to go.

This process of having to raise money for kindergarten leaves me frustrated. But I'm excited that Jett will be going to this school that seems to have such committed, action-oriented parents. We'll know by June 28 (the deadline for raising funds) if we've raised enough or not, and then I can really start freaking out (or hopefully not). Either way, you'll hear all about it!

If you'd like to donate to full-day kindergarten at his school you can do that here.