Early Kindergarten Entrance

PROCEDURE FOR EARLY KINDERGARTEN ENTRANCE

Children reaching the age of four years, nine  months on/or before December 31st of any year may be eligible for kindergarten in the preceding September.

1. Early admission will be at parental request only.

Parents may make a  request to the Assistant Superintendent for Pupil Services for information on early entrance.

The Assistant Superintendent of Pupil Personnel Services will send to the parents a letter explaining the process of early kindergarten entrance, attribute list, and application form.  The information will also include a release of information form for Preschool Teacher Rating Form..

Parents should return completed application form to Assistant Superintendent of Pupil Personnel Services.

As part of the initial screening process, a school psychologist and a kindergarten teacher from the child’s home school will arrange to observe the child prior to the team meeting.  The observation may be in the preschool the child is attending or, if the child is not enrolled in preschool, an observation can be set up utilizing the Stepping Stones preschool class.  The observation should focus on the social, emotional, verbal, and physical maturity of the child.

A team meeting, which includes the building principal, school psychologist, and kindergarten teacher, will be scheduled to review the completed application, preschool rating form, and preschool observation.  If the school team does not recommend early entrance to kindergarten, a parent meeting is scheduled to review the team’s findings.  A follow up letter is sent to the parent by the building principal informing the parent of the team’s recommendation.

If the school team agrees that the child is a candidate for early entrance to kindergarten, then an evaluation of the child by the building school psychologist is arranged to ensure that the following criteria are met:.

1. Obtains a Full scale IQ score with minimal test scatter that would place him/her in the top 1% of the general population.
    
2. Has superior linguistic competence as evidenced by grammatical capacity, articulation and extensive use of expressive language.
    
3. Shows evidence of reading readiness or may have already learned to read informally at home.
    
4. Demonstrates emotional maturity similar to those children entering kindergarten.
    

Once the psychological evaluation is completed, a team meeting (including the building principal, school psychologist, and a kindergarten teacher) is held in order to review all information and make a recommendation.  All possible steps will be taken to render a prompt decision to the parent.

Following the team meeting, a parent meeting is scheduled to review the team’s findings, including the psychological evaluation.  A follow up letter to the parent is sent by the building principal informing the parent of the school team’s recommendation for early entrance to kindergarten.

A review of each child admitted will be held the following spring by the child’s kindergarten teacher, building school psychologist, the building principal and the parent to determine readiness for Grade One.