Children who attend pre-school tend to be better prepared for kindergarten, and more likely to graduate.
That's according to Lynn Lubecki, the executive director of the Rochester Childfirst Network.
She says pre-k programs help equip children with the basic skills necessary to be successful in school.
"They follow a predictable routine, practice making choices, and thinking and imagining. Children experiment in u-p-k (universal pre-kindergarten),” Lubecki say. “They problem solve, learn how to get along. They learn how to write their names and, sometimes, their friend’s names. These are milestones that provide the foundation for later learning."
Tuesday, the mayor and Rochester City School Superintendent Bolgen Vargas encouraged parents to enroll their children into the city's free universal pre-k program.
Vargas says the universal pre-school program aims to ease the burden on some Rochester families who are living in poverty. He says that's to provide an opportunity for their children to receive an education at no cost.
"Many of our children come to school not prepared for kindergarten,” Vargas says. “This is a way that … as a family you can make assures that your family would be ready for kindergarten and to set him or her into the trajectory to succeed in school."
Approximately 15-hundred children are registered for the upcoming school year, according to the district. Last year, they had upwards of 2-thousand kids registered in among the 56 universal pre-k locations in Rochester.
The two and half hour a day program is available to city residents with a children four-years of age, or who will turn four-years old by December 1st.
The Rochester Pre-K program uses the lesson aligned with the New York State Foundation for the Common Core Pre-kindergarten Standards. Funding for the program is through the state Education Department.