The Volokh Conspiracy - Why Require College Educations for Preschool Teachers, Even in State-Funded Programs?

Proposition 82, which will be voted on soon in California, would raise taxes on rich taxpayers to fund broader preschool education. There are lots of things to say about it, but here's one item that particularly struck me: The Proposition would require that "by July 2014, all teachers in the new state preschool program must have a four-year college degree. (Researchers estimate that around 30 percent of preschool teachers in California currently have a college degree.)"

How can that possibly be sensible or fair? Teaching and taking care of small children is important work, but a college education seems highly unlikely to make one better at that work. What's more, the degree need not be in anything related to early education. Knowing college-level math, college-level science, college-level English, and the like may be valuable for a lot of jobs. But how is it valuable for teaching preschool-level skills and knowledge?

The Proposition does provide that, "By July 2016, teachers would also need to hold a new early learning teaching credential," which "would likely require an additional year of education beyond a college degree." But even if requiring the credential would be sensible, it doesn't explain why the credential needs to be on top of an unrelated college degree. (The current requirements, according to the ballot pamphlet, are 40 units — about 1 1/4 years of college — of which 24 units must be in early childhood education.)

So as a result, it seems to me that this proposal would raise the cost of education (though it apparently also mandates such cost increases independently of the college degree requirement). It would also shut out of this field lots of excellent caregivers and preschool teachers who don't have a 4-year college degree, who don't want to spend the time to get a college degree, and who might not have the temperaments, skill set, or the cognitive capacity to do well in a 4-year college (not everyone does have such a temperament, skill set, and cognitive capacity, and my sense is that one can be a very good teacher of 4-year-olds without having those attributes). Of course, lots of preschool teachers and would-be preschool teachers do have college degrees, and have done well in college; good for them. But that doesn't tell us that such degrees should be required.

Also, let me ask a legal question: Under current civil rights law, some kinds of policies that are neutral as to race (on their face and in their intentions) may still be illegally discriminatory if they have a substantial disparate impact on members of some racial groups, and don't have enough of a business justification. In fact, the leading case on this, Griggs v. Duke Power Co. (1971), struck down an education requirement — a requirement that janitors have a high school education. Now I think that Griggs was wrongly decided, but it's the law, and in any event the Civil Rights Act of 1991 made clear as a statutory matter that this "disparate impact" theory is viable.

I'm not an expert on this part of employment law, so let me ask people who are: Would programs implemented pursuant to Proposition 82 be similarly vulnerable to a disparate impact claim, if — as I suspect is the case — blacks and Hispanics in California are materially less likely than whites and Asians to have 4-year college degrees? (I am not saying that being a preschool teacher is like being a janitor in most ways. My suggestion is simply that, just as being a good janitor requires some important skills but not the ones that high school teaches, so being a preschool teacher requires other important skills but not the ones that college teaches. Being a preschool teacher isn't easy; I think I'd do horribly at it; but my point is simply that my college degree wouldn't make me, or anyone else, any better at doing such a job.)

If you are knowledgeable about the disparate impact theory, please post your answers in the comments below. (If you aren't knowledgeable about the theory, please feel free to comment on the policy questions I'm discussing, but please avoid speculating about the legal question, which is technical enough that it probably requires technical knowledge to answer.)

Incidentally, I do not think the requirement is so irrational as to violate the Equal Protection Clause. Under that Clause, the legal test for such requirements is very forgiving — one simply has to come up with some conceivable "rational basis" for it, and the theory that college graduates are likely to be on average smarter than non-college-graduates (not always, but on average) would definitely qualify. But to say that a program passes the rational basis test is hardly a high compliment, and surely doesn't tell us that the program is sensible or fair.

	[Eugene Volokh, May 22, 2006 at 4:29pm] Trackbacks Why Require College Educations for Preschool Teachers, Even in State-Funded Programs? Proposition 82, which will be voted on soon in California, would raise taxes on rich taxpayers to fund broader preschool education. There are lots of things to say about it, but here's one item that particularly struck me: The Proposition would require that "by July 2014, all teachers in the new state preschool program must have a four-year college degree. (Researchers estimate that around 30 percent of preschool teachers in California currently have a college degree.)" How can that possibly be sensible or fair? Teaching and taking care of small children is important work, but a college education seems highly unlikely to make one better at that work. What's more, the degree need not be in anything related to early education. Knowing college-level math, college-level science, college-level English, and the like may be valuable for a lot of jobs. But how is it valuable for teaching preschool-level skills and knowledge? The Proposition does provide that, "By July 2016, teachers would also need to hold a new early learning teaching credential," which "would likely require an additional year of education beyond a college degree." But even if requiring the credential would be sensible, it doesn't explain why the credential needs to be on top of an unrelated college degree. (The current requirements, according to the ballot pamphlet, are 40 units — about 1 1/4 years of college — of which 24 units must be in early childhood education.) So as a result, it seems to me that this proposal would raise the cost of education (though it apparently also mandates such cost increases independently of the college degree requirement). It would also shut out of this field lots of excellent caregivers and preschool teachers who don't have a 4-year college degree, who don't want to spend the time to get a college degree, and who might not have the temperaments, skill set, or the cognitive capacity to do well in a 4-year college (not everyone does have such a temperament, skill set, and cognitive capacity, and my sense is that one can be a very good teacher of 4-year-olds without having those attributes). Of course, lots of preschool teachers and would-be preschool teachers do have college degrees, and have done well in college; good for them. But that doesn't tell us that such degrees should be required. Also, let me ask a legal question: Under current civil rights law, some kinds of policies that are neutral as to race (on their face and in their intentions) may still be illegally discriminatory if they have a substantial disparate impact on members of some racial groups, and don't have enough of a business justification. In fact, the leading case on this, Griggs v. Duke Power Co. (1971), struck down an education requirement — a requirement that janitors have a high school education. Now I think that Griggs was wrongly decided, but it's the law, and in any event the Civil Rights Act of 1991 made clear as a statutory matter that this "disparate impact" theory is viable. I'm not an expert on this part of employment law, so let me ask people who are: Would programs implemented pursuant to Proposition 82 be similarly vulnerable to a disparate impact claim, if — as I suspect is the case — blacks and Hispanics in California are materially less likely than whites and Asians to have 4-year college degrees? (I am not saying that being a preschool teacher is like being a janitor in most ways. My suggestion is simply that, just as being a good janitor requires some important skills but not the ones that high school teaches, so being a preschool teacher requires other important skills but not the ones that college teaches. Being a preschool teacher isn't easy; I think I'd do horribly at it; but my point is simply that my college degree wouldn't make me, or anyone else, any better at doing such a job.) If you are knowledgeable about the disparate impact theory, please post your answers in the comments below. (If you aren't knowledgeable about the theory, please feel free to comment on the policy questions I'm discussing, but please avoid speculating about the legal question, which is technical enough that it probably requires technical knowledge to answer.) Incidentally, I do not think the requirement is so irrational as to violate the Equal Protection Clause. Under that Clause, the legal test for such requirements is very forgiving — one simply has to come up with some conceivable "rational basis" for it, and the theory that college graduates are likely to be on average smarter than non-college-graduates (not always, but on average) would definitely qualify. But to say that a program passes the rational basis test is hardly a high compliment, and surely doesn't tell us that the program is sensible or fair.