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SACRAMENTO — State Superintendent of Public Instruction Jack O'Connell and Assembly Member Lori Saldaña today joined military and local education officials to celebrate the adoption of emergency preschool regulations that will benefit military families.

"I am pleased to announce the passage of emergency regulations that will lift a bureaucratic burden that was unwittingly placed on some of our military families, depriving them of quality preschool that was intended to serve them," O'Connell said. "I want to thank all of you who have worked so hard on this issue for the benefit of military families with young children, and particularly would like to thank Assembly Member Lori Saldaña, who has been a tireless champion for military families in her district and throughout California."

"Military families move an average of seven times in the course of their children's K-12 school career," Saldaña said. "This can lead to social and educational setbacks that are difficult and expensive to remedy. The academic and social jumpstart provided by preschool can serve as a defense against constant relocation and interruptions in their school experience. I think that all of us have had one goal all along – to give the children of military service members the head start that preschool provides."

Over the last few years, the military has gradually privatized military housing by providing many families with a housing allowance instead of free housing. This practice has the effect of artificially inflating many families' income, putting them over the income eligibility level for state preschool. The new preschool regulations take into account the inflated incomes and make state preschool more available to the children of military personnel.

Also joining O'Connell and Saldaña were Shelia Jackson, board member for the San Diego Unified School District; Sam Merrick of Lincoln Military Housing; Sue Coyle, the Superintendent of Coronado Unified School District; U.S. Navy Captain Mark Patton; and Brenda Cooklin, a military parent who now qualifies for preschool services under the new regulations.

To view the emergency regulations, please visit Military Regulations (DOC; 22KB; 1p.).