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"'This time of the year, we would have had about 15 students in the 9th grade drop out. They get discouraged and don't come back after Christmas break,' said Nathan White, 53, principal of C.A. Johnson High School, which serves a low-income area in downtown Columbia."

"Republicans have generally said they are not against early childhood education but that taxpayers shouldn't pay for preschool for families who can afford it. They favor providing assistance to low-income families rather than paying for a statewide program."

"A new school funding formula is headed for debate in the Senate that would grant extra funding weight to districts for all poor students and those who have trouble speaking English."

"The Georgia Public Service Commission has approved a $5 million grant to provide assistance to low-income senior citizens who are natural gas customers in the Atlanta Gas Light Company distribution area."

"Melissa and Orlando Winters make enough money to scrape by, but too much to qualify for government-run preschool programs for low-income families. The couple worry Iowa lawmakers will wipe out universal preschool just as their daughter... becomes eligible for it."

"Famed child advocate Marian Wright Edelman on Monday helped celebrate a Charlotte literacy program for low-income children whose success has been validated by a new UNC Charlotte study."

"The corporate scholarship measure would provide tax credits to companies that donate cash to nonprofit organizations that provide private-school scholarships to low-income students."

"'These are kids below the poverty level and there is an enormous volume of research showing that preparing children for success in school in these early years ... is a tremendously positive investment,' Britt said."

"Imagine a public school district that doesn't offer kindergarten or athletics and has so few elective classes that high school juniors and seniors only attend school for half a day."

"A city ordinance requires 15 percent of housing in new growth areas to be affordable to low- and very-low-income people."

Topic(s): Aging, Economic Opportunity, Education, Health

"The reason for the gathering, which included historian John Hope Franklin and civil rights matriarch Dorothy Height, was to address growing rates of poverty among black children."