Within the $87 billion higher education bill passed by the House of Representatives in September was a new federal initiative aimed at the youngest learners in the country, children from birth through age five. The Early Learning Challenge Fund would provide $8 billion over eight years to states with plans to improve programs for infants, toddlers and preschoolers. The Senate is expected to pass a similar bill, with December as the target date for the presidential signature.

The Challenge Fund reflects Barack Obama’s proposal during the 2008 campaign for public investment in nurturing young children, especially the disadvantaged. This was seen in the economic stimulus bill which appropriated more than $4 billion in new funding for early child care and education, including Head Start, serving about 900,000 preschoolers. The Fund also is the direct result of significant and fascinating scientific research in recent years on how the brain develops and works from the youngest months through early childhood.

First let’s look at the current state of early learning nationwide. Programs are run at Head Start centers, public schools, churches, synagogues, homes and storefronts. Funding comes from a changing mix of private, local, state and federal dollars. A half or full day includes play, socialization activities, arts and crafts and beginning formal instruction. Debate continues as to the value of introducing the ABC’s too early. Oversight varies from state to state, ranging from a minimum of safety standards to more structured curricula in private programs in wealthier districts. The result is that poor children often enter kindergarten less prepared for school.

The Challenge Fund will be administered jointly by the Departments of Education and Health and Human Services. To qualify for grants, states will have to show that they have already established or improved a “governance structure” for their networks of child care centers and pre-kindergarten programs. The structure is detailed: a curriculum appropriate for young children; quality standards; minimum requirements for providers; an outreach to parents; and a system for collecting data on children and families. Anyone with experience in education knows that each of these categories has enormous room for interpretation. It is in reality an outline of what the states should aim for, and different states are at different starting points. Professor Lynn Kagan, a professor at Columbia University’s Teachers College is optimistic. She said of the Fund, “No one bill can solve everything, but this will move us more than any other piece of legislation toward higher quality in early education, not just more spaces for children.”

During the current economic recession, most states have been hit with deep deficits and severe budget crises. Nine states have announced cuts to state-run pre-kindergarten programs: Alabama, California, Connecticut, Florida, Iowa, Minnesota, New York, North Carolina and South Carolina. Ohio lawmakers cut out their Early Learning Initiative for 12,000 children to save $125 million. Illinois reduced the budget for its Pre-K for All program from $338 million to $305million , losing access for 9,500 children. In contrast, the good news is that nearly 30 states have maintained or increased their financing for early learning programs.

President Obama and Secretary of Education Arne Duncan are committed to increasing support for early childhood education, based on research that shows the benefits of nurturing the development of the youngest children. Secretary Duncan also emphasized the “payback” to the taxpayers when he said, “For every dollar we spend on these programs, we get nearly $10 back in reduced welfare rolls, fewer health care costs and less crime.”

What have been the findings of the latest research in the field of neurological studies of early brain development? Al Race, director of communications at the Center on The Developing Child at Harvard University, summed it up dramatically, “Babies are born learning. Learning is what builds the brain’s architecture.” Research that took place in Washington D.C. at the National Research Council and Institute of Medicine revealed the early years as “profoundly determinative of an individual’s fundamental ability to learn, achieve and participate in a civil society.” The studies showed that early experiences “directly affect how the intricate circuitry of the brain is wired. In fact, the brain’s greatest capacity to change and compensate occurs during the first three years.”

It may be hard for non-scientists to accept, but the neurological research found that by age two, an infant’s brain has twice as many synapses as an adult’s. And those activated often by repeated early experiences will likely be permanent while those less frequently used will be eliminated. The conclusion is that brain development is greatly affected by environmental influences, especially in the earliest years. “Language development is the core of all learning,” says Cornelia Grumman, director of The First Five Years Fund. “We must start early.” Research shows that by age 3, children from low-income families are behind middle and upper-income families in vocabulary. In homes with both parents working full time at low-paying jobs, there are far fewer hours to engage in conversation or to read bedtime stories. The parental atmosphere may be loving but the hours are not there.

Professor Alison Gopnik, professor of psychology at Berkeley, has conducted research with children at the University. She wrote in a New York Times article, “Your Baby is Smarter Than You Think,” that “New studies demonstrate that babies and very young children know, observe, explore, imagine and learn more than we would ever have thought possible. In some ways, they are smarter than adults.” She explained that the young brain is remarkably plastic and flexible. She also emphasized that, “What children observe most closely, explore most obsessively and imagine most vividly are the people around them . . . Parents and other caregivers teach young children by paying attention and interacting with them naturally and, most of all, by just allowing them to play.”

Joyce S. Anderson is the author of “Courage in High Heels,” “Flaw in the Tapestry,” “If Winter Comes” and “The Mermaids Singing.” She can be reached at JSAWrite@aol.com.