MIAMI -- Fifty members of a local grassroots community organization boarded a bus today headed for Tallahassee. Their mission -- improving education for Florida's pre-kindergarten students.

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Pre-K Caravan Headed To State Capitol

The members plan to meet with Lt. Gov. Toni Jennings and will be joined by 700 other community members from around the state. They will demand support for a plan to ensure high-quality statewide education standards for pre-kindergarten students.

Their plan includes the following measures, according to the organization's press release:

Adoption of proven curricula for the universal pre-K program, which incorporates systematic and explicit language instruction, complemented by early literacy and phonemic awareness instruction.
Allocation of a substantial part of the day to literacy related and language instruction at each universal pre-K instructional site.
Training and professional development sufficient for teachers in the universal pre-K program to properly implement the programs they will be using
Pre- and post-testing of children in the universal pre-K program to evaluate the effectiveness of the program and to diagnose individual student needs so that no student "falls through the cracks"

Gloria Whilby, member of Fulford United Methodist Church and long term leader of the South Florida group said, "We can't afford to waste state money on a baby-sitting program for 4-year-olds. (Universal pre-K) has great potential to dramatically improve the lives of thousands of children. I'm going on this trip because I want to make sure that this program is effective and lives up to that potential."