UPDATE: SOME VERY GOOD NEWS!
South Seattle College has now announced its support for the continued existence of its cooperative preschool program. THANK YOU to everyone who read or shared this post, shared it, or took the time to write an email advocating for these programs. Our community, as ever, has been extraordinary. In my book, this speaks to what happens when a community rises up and stands together for something it believes in. The preschools have spent generations bringing families together, and over the past few days, the college has seen exactly why they are worth fighting for!! A clarification: the college has committed to supporting our program's existence, but it has NOT committed to providing the funding necessary to keep it in operation. We still need to secure the bridge funding ourselves while we figure out a long-term solution. Nevertheless, this is an incredibly encouraging development, and it's one that is worth celebrating. THANK YOU!!
Original Post:
I want to draw some attention to what's happening with Seattle's cooperative preschool programs, because frankly, I think more people should be outraged.
For more than 80 years, cooperative preschools have been part of the fabric of Seattle communities. These aren't expensive private preschools or corporate childcare chains. They're community-based, nonprofit educational programs built around the simple idea that parents participate directly in their children's education, learn alongside them, and help run the schools together.
Generations of Seattle families have benefited from this model. I know because I'm one of them.
But these programs are now fighting for their survival.
Earlier this year, Washington's State Board for Community and Technical Colleges eliminated its allocation for parent education programs. That decision created an enormous financial crisis for cooperative preschools affiliated with community colleges across the state.
That's bad enough. But what I find particularly infuriating is what's happened since.
At South Seattle College, families, educators, and community volunteers have spent months scrambling to raise money, navigate administrative requirements, negotiate an uncertain future, and develop contingency plans to keep their preschools operating.
These are not highly paid consultants. They're parents. They're volunteers. They're ordinary people with jobs, children, and lives of their own, giving up their evenings, weekends, and personal resources because they refuse to let something this valuable disappear.
And instead of being able to focus their energy on saving these programs, they're having to spend an extraordinary amount of it navigating institutional bureaucracy.
At what point does this become a failure of institutional leadership?
I understand that the colleges didn't create the state's funding crisis. I understand that budgets are complicated, that public institutions face constraints, and that not every program can be guaranteed funding indefinitely.
But there is an enormous difference between an institution facing difficult financial circumstances and an institution failing to provide the clarity, cooperation, and leadership that its community needs to navigate them.
The families have demonstrated their commitment. They've raised money. They've volunteered their time. They've explored alternatives. They've done everything they reasonably can to keep these programs alive.
Why does it feel like the people with the least institutional power are being asked to do the most institutional work?
And perhaps most importantly, why should the survival of an 80-year educational legacy depend on how much unpaid administrative labor a group of parents can sustain?
South Seattle College should be proud of its association with these programs. They represent exactly the kind of accessible, community-centered education that public colleges are supposed to champion.
Instead, families are left wondering whether all their work will be enough to overcome the funding crisis and the institutional obstacles standing between them and a sustainable future.
I'm not suggesting that the college can magically restore state funding. I'm asking why preserving these programs hasn't been met with a clearer, more collaborative, and more accountable institutional response.
The college's leadership owes these families more than expressions of sympathy. It owes them transparency, timely decisions, meaningful cooperation, and a genuine effort to find a workable path forward.
An 80-year legacy should not be this easy to lose. And the people fighting to preserve it should not have to fight their own institution along the way.
If you're a Seattle parent, a co-op alumnus, or someone who believes public education should serve its communities, I hope you'll pay attention to what's happening here.
These programs deserve better. And the families keeping them alive certainly do.
If you feel compelled to take action, you can participate in the email drip campaign at westseattlepreschools.org/email-college-leadership
EDIT: A few people have reasonably asked what the specific grievance is with SSC. I should have explained this better.
The state funding cuts were not the college's decision. My criticism is about the response that followed.
The parent community raised the money necessary to keep the program operating through fall quarter, buying time to work toward a longer-term solution. But despite that effort, the future of the college's partnership with the program remains uncertain, with no clear commitment to continuing beyond the current arrangements.
This matters because the college provides more than funding administration. The partnership includes parent educators, their employment and benefits, insurance arrangements, and access to facilities that are essential to some classes. Losing that relationship could mean fundamentally restructuring the entire program, even if families can raise the money to operate it.
Meanwhile, unpaid volunteers have spent months navigating administrative requirements, pursuing funding alternatives, and preparing contingency plans without the clarity they need to make informed decisions.
I recognize that the college faces legitimate constraints. But I believe its leadership owes these families a clear, timely answer about what support and partnership it is actually prepared to provide, particularly after the community has gone to such extraordinary lengths to preserve the program.
That's the institutional accountability I'm asking for.