In
my first post in this series on Jumpstart (jstart.org) a national organization
dedicated to developing literacy in underprivileged preschools, I raised the
following question: how much can and does Jumpstart really accomplish? As this
series has tracked social barriers to education and the political stakes of
providing quality education, it has become clear that the impact of Jumpstart
is tangled up in many different factors. No child is an island, separate from
the circumstances of his or her life; with barriers like school closings and
lack of resources affecting children’s educations, how can Jumpstart make a
difference through the albeit noble and important cause of developing language
and literacy skills? [...]
