ATLANTA — Georgia’s House Speaker is pushing new legislation that could make pre-K teacher pay equal to that of kindergarten teachers and reduce pre-K class size.

“We can’t just maintain what we’re doing as far as educational opportunities,” State Rep. Jon Burns, (R-Newington) said. “We must improve.”

Burns appointed the Speaker Pro Temp, State Rep. Jan Jones (R-Milton) to head the study group.

Jones said she looked into all aspects of pre-K education to try and find ways to improve it.

“We really haven’t done a full evaluation of pre-K in Georgia in a long time,” Jones said.

Her group is recommending things like reducing the maximum pre-K class size from 22 to 20, increasing the amount of start-up funds available to open up classrooms from $8,000 to $30,000, providing more funding for the capital costs of opening new classrooms, and raising pre-K teacher pay to make them equal to other teachers.

“What are the qualifications to be a pre-K teacher?” Jones said. “It turned out that it’s the exact same to be a kindergarten teacher. You have to have a four-year degree in early childhood education, but yet, the salaries are not commensurate with kindergarten teachers.”

Burns is expected to take the recommendations and propose legislation to implement them.

“It’s my belief that one of the best predictors of educational success is having a strong foundation at the pre-K level,” Burns said. “To me, that just makes a lot of common sense.”

WSB-TV’s Richard Elliot contributed to this story.

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