Pre-K Request for Proposal

The following are key dates for proposals:

Please submit two (2) copies of the proposal and other documentation in a sealed envelope marked “Proposal for Pre-Kindergarten Services” no later than April 15, 2026 at 3:00 to the contact below. Any questions regarding the proposals should also be directed to:

Joseph Palmer
Superintendent
605 Palmer St.
Frankfort, NY 13340

 I.  Program Design and Quality of Programmatic Oversight and Fiscal Management

Include a detailed narrative which articulates the applicant agency’s/CBO’s philosophy and mission, describes how the eligible collaborating prekindergarten program proposes to provide services that meets the goals and objectives of the district's collaborative prekindergarten program for new full-day four-year-old placements including: 

• Demonstrated experience, capacity and effectiveness in immediately implementing an innovative, creative, developmentally appropriate, culturally responsive and sustaining full-day prekindergarten program serving four-year-old students, including those who are ability- and language-diverse;
   
• Effective, efficient, and collaborative administrative structure, record management and documentation procedures.
   
• Fiscal solvency and anticipated fiscal share and other resources that will be contributed full-day prekindergarten program for four-year-old students;
   

II. Facility Quality

Provide detailed documentation and description that all applicable health and safety codes and licensure or registration requirements are met. These include the design, sanitation, maintenance, and repair of CBO-operated pre kindergarten buildings, classrooms, premises, equipment, and furnishings with the objective of maximizing child development and early learning while protecting the health and safety of students at all times. The agency/CBO ensures compliance with all application requirements of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA).

The collaborating prekindergarten program classrooms and buildings meet all applicable fire safety and building codes and any applicable facility requirements of a state or local licensing or registering agency, including, but not limited to those related to emergency evacuation plans, and health / medical procedures, and as recorded on documents such as day care licenses, certificates of occupancy, and health inspection reports (if meals are prepared on site.)

The agency/CBO must utilize the New York State Education Department’s Prekindergarten Health and Safety Checklist as one component of a comprehensive physical plant review inspection protocol, the school district performs at least one inspection of a potential collaborating prekindergarten program collaborator’s facility before entering into a contract to provide collaborative prekindergarten programming. 

Upon entering a contract, the school district performs at least one additional annual facility inspection of collaborating CBO facilities.

At minimum, a second annual facility inspection will be performed by each CBO’s respective licensing, permitting, regulatory, oversight, registration, or enrolling agency. All collaborating-operated prekindergarten programs must provide access to all records, property, and personnel related to the program during all inspections. The New York State Education Department may also perform facility inspections of the collaborating prekindergarten program sites.

Provide a detailed description of the agency’s demonstrated success in assessing and meeting the needs of diverse learners, including children with disabilities in integrated settings and Emergent Multilingual Learners in English and home language development.

•  School District Coordination of Prekindergarten Outreach through Placement]
  
  The school district coordinates and conducts all outreach, recruitment, eligibility, registration, lottery (if necessary), waitlist, enrollment, intake, and placement of students in the school district and collaborating prekindergarten programs.
   
• Student Eligibility
  
  The school district verifies each eligible student’s age and school district residency. Eligible child means a child who resides within the school district who is four years of age on or before December 1st of the enrolled school year, or who will otherwise be first eligible to enter public school kindergarten commencing the following school year. 
   
• New Entrant and Prekindergarten Initial Screening
  
  Please provide a plan to communicate to the district all new entrants. The school district screens all new entrants, including those entering school district and collaborating prekindergarten programs to identify those who may need additional diagnostic assessments that could possibly result in the determination of ability-diverse (preschool students with disabilities and/or gifted) and/or language-diverse (Emergent Multilingual Learners in Prekindergarten).
   
  • Upon prekindergarten enrollment, the school district administers a valid and reliable screening tool that, at a minimum, assesses each student’s language, cognitive, and social-emotional development.
     
  • Screening results are documented, protected, shared with each student’s family, and used to inform instruction, address the needs of individual children, improve prekindergarten program practice, and inform professional learning.
     
• Progress Monitoring Assessments
  
  It is requested that the agency/CBO use the same initial screening process and progress monitoring assessments. These must be completed at least twice during the school year.The progress monitoring assessments must be valid and reliable to measure the progress of each pre kindergarten student’s language, cognitive, and social-emotional development.
   
  • Progress monitoring assessment results are documented, protected, shared with each student’s family, and used to inform instruction, address the needs of individual children, improve prekindergarten program practice, and inform professional learning.
     
  • At the end of each school year, the school district reports aggregate student progress monitoring data to the New York State Education Department via the Final Prekindergarten Program Report. Prekindergarten programs are considered effective and students demonstrate significant gains in language, cognitive, and social-emotional development.
     
  • The school district ensures that any measurement of student outcomes in prekindergarten will not be used to make high-stakes educational decisions for individual children. For example, such data is not used to preclude or discourage a child’s enrollment in kindergarten.

Provide a detailed plan of the agency’s/CBO’s capacity, current funding sources (if any), resources, and structures to develop fiscal and logistical arrangements with the school district to provide students with appropriate and sufficient meals and snacks.

• Meals and Snacks
  
  Each student’s nutritional needs are sufficiently met through the provision of appropriate meals and snacks.
   
• Family Style Dining
  
  Nutritious meals and snacks within the CBO settings are provided at appropriate times and for sufficient durations conducive to meaningful student-student and student-staff interactions.
   
• Physical Activity
  
  Collaborating prekindergarten programs provide students with a variety of daily opportunities to engage in developmentally appropriate activities that are indoor and outdoor, structured and unstructured, and moderately to vigorously physical. 

Provide a detailed description of documented protocols for ensuring adherence to the following requirements related to the learning environment and curriculum:

• Schedule and Activities for Student-Centered Learning & Development
   
  •   Utilizing differentiated instruction with an emphasis on language, emergent literacy, early mathematical skills, social and emotional development, physical abilities, and structured and unstructured play, school district and collaborating prekindergarten program space, scheduling, environment, and learning activities advance student-centered learning and development.
     
  • Children are encouraged to be self-assured and independent through an intentionally-planned daily schedule of teacher-initiated learning activities (2/3 of day) and child-initiated learning activities (1/3 of day) that balances active & quiet play, indoor & outdoor gross motor activities, and individual & small group activities.
     
  • Early literacy and emergent reading instruction is based on effective, evidence-based practices with essential components including, but not limited to:
     
    • Background knowledge,
    • Phonological awareness,
    • Receptive and expressive language,
    • Vocabulary development, and
    • Phonemic awareness.
       
• Learning Centers
  
  Description of classrooms with clearly-defined, well-equipped learning centers that promote a balance of individual and small group activities. Learning centers include, but are not limited to: 
   
  • Blocks and construction;
  • Creative Arts;
  • Dramatic play;
  • Literacy (Language Arts, Reading/Writing, Library, including Home Language Library);
  • Mathematics and Manipulatives;
  • Media/ Technology;
  • Music / Movement;
  • Sand and Water play / Sensory;
  • Science and Nature;
     
• Curriculum and Instruction
  
  The school district and its collaborating prekindergarten program utilize a developmentally appropriate written curriculum that:
   
  • Is evidenced-based (meaning research has been conducted regarding the relationship between the curriculum and children's learning);
     
  • Aligns to NYSED’s Prekindergarten Early Learning Standards
     
  • Incorporates the key domains of child development as outlined in NYSED’s Resource Guide School Success in Prekindergarten;
     
  • Emphasizes language, emergent literacy, early mathematics skills, social and emotional development, physical abilities, and structured & unstructured play;
     
  • Facilitates and supports individualized, differentiated, and responsive and sustaining instruction for diverse abilities, cultures, and languages
     
  • Ensures continuity with instruction in the early elementary grades, and
     
  • Integrates with the school district’s Kindergarten-Grade 12 instructional program.
     
• Preschool Students with Disabilities
  
  Adequate and appropriate accommodations, modifications, and supports to enable preschool students with disabilities effective and equitable access, inclusion, and integration in the full range of the program’s curriculum, instruction, activities, goals, and objectives.
   
• Emergent Multilingual Learners (EML)
  
  Implement adequate and appropriate accommodations, modifications, and supports to enable language-diverse Emergent Multilingual Learners (EML) with effective and equitable access, inclusion, and integration in the full range of the program’s curriculum, instruction, activities, goals, and objectives.

Provide a detailed narrative of the agency’s/CBO’s ease of utilization and accessibility of the program to families, parents, and/or guardians and the adherence to following the requirements related to family engagement & support, the partnerships with non-profit, community, and educational institutions in collaborating prekindergarten program settings:

• Family Engagement Policy and Practice
  
  Active engagement of families, parents, and/or guardians in the education of their children at either a school district and/or collaborating prekindergarten programs. 
  
  The plan should reflect outreach strategies and how families are engaged free-of-charge in the languages they understand. Examples of active engagement may include, but are not limited to, written communication with families, one-on-one meetings, parent workshops and training on such topics as child development, language development, multilingualism, educational disabilities, and the special education referral process; opportunities for families to volunteer, and opportunities for families, parents, and/or guardians to participate in program- and school-level decisions and program improvement. 
   
• Annual Program Evaluation Completed by Families
  
  Families, parents, and/or guardians annually complete a prekindergarten program evaluation and/or survey. The school district applies results to program improvement, and regularly provides updated program quality information to families and the community.
   
• Community Partnerships / Comprehensive Support Services
  
  Whenever possible, comprehensive services are provided in collaboration with other community organizations in a non-duplicative manner. Comprehensive services are provided to the maximum extent practicable in the language or mode of communication which the parents and/or guardians and the child best understand.

Provide a detailed narrative of the collaborating prekindergarten program’s relationship with the school district’s in transitioning their four-year-old students and families to kindergarten.

Provide a detailed budget that aligns to those in NYSED’s FS-10 Proposed Budget, such as salaries for professional staff and support staff, employee benefits supplies and materials, travel expenses, and employee benefits.