Pre-K Funding Awareness, United Ways of Texas

In 2011, the Texas Legislature cut approximately $5.3 billion from public schools, including $200 million in pre-kindergarten grants funding. Therefore, United Ways of Texas contracted Cultural Strategies to develop an awareness campaign about the state of pre-k funding in Texas and gather research that captured Latino parent’s priorities and concerns regarding their children’s pre-k education. In partnership with five local United Ways and support from the Pew Charitable Trusts, Cultural Strategies assisted United Ways of Texas to develop a brand - Movimiento Pre-K - for this initiative. Cultural Strategies also developed and administered across Texas a bilingual quantitative survey asking parents about the programs that were most important for them, what potential impact they foresaw from the cuts, and what options they had if cuts were implemented. The results provided United Ways and policy makers valuable insights into Latino parents’ concerns regarding their children’s pre-k education.