Temecula woman honored for work in early childhood education

By: Jose Carvajal - For The Californian | Sunday, December 5, 2004 9:20 PM PST ∞

Harriet Egertson walked in expecting to dine with colleagues. Instead, the 64-year-old Temecula resident walked out of the Nov. 8 annual dinner of the National Association of Early Childhood Specialists in State Departments of Education shocked and speechless.

For her contributions to the field of early childhood education, Egertson was presented with the first-ever Early Childhood Educational Leadership Award, sponsored by the children's book publisher Scholastic Corp., during a special ceremony that night in Anaheim.

"I was utterly surprised, overwhelmed by it," said Egertson, who moved to Temecula in 2003, a year after retiring from the Nebraska Department of Education. "I probably was as close to without words as I've ever been."

Scholastic chose to recognize Egertson for the contributions she made during a 42-year career that began in a West Covina classroom, eventually shifted to the Nebraska Department of Education and reached several national publications and associations.

Egertson's dream career wasn't always education. At first, it was engineering.

"In those days, that was not what girls were supposed to do," she said. So, instead, she got a bachelor's degree in education from San Francisco State College.

Her first job was as a first-grade teacher in a classroom with a whopping 38 students in a half-day session.

That, she said, is where she probably developed her tenacity.

"I stayed," Egertson said. "It was a great year."

After teaching in California and then Nebraska for 15 years, Egertson decided to see if she could make an impact at the state level. And after taking a position at the Nebraska Department of Education, she earned a master's degree in elementary education and administration and a doctorate in early childhood development from the University of Nebraska.

A self-described "sparkly" person around children, Egertson said she didn't have too many problems making the transition from teacher to bureaucrat.

"I didn't think I was going to be there very long," she said. "I went into it with the idea that I wasn't going to let the system get in the way of getting things done."

Among her many accomplishments, she said she is most proud of the work she has done involving kindergarten entrance.

In some schools, certain practices segregate less-

developed children, she said. Some of those children are encouraged to wait a year before entering kindergarten, while others are placed in different classrooms.

"All of the research on all these practices is very negative," Egertson said. "I think it's drifting back to something to be very concerned about."

It's important that something be done, she added, because children develop their sense of curiosity at this young age.

Another thing that may potentially stymie a child's development is too much focus on achievement-based education, she said. While Egertson said that all achievement-based education isn't necessarily bad, she also said that putting too much pressure on children may turn them off to their teachers.

She gave the example of one elementary school where students are required to count to 1,000 before moving on to the first grade.

"That's just bad," Egertson said. "Children who have that kind of pressure put on them are just put off."

These days, Egertson still finds herself busy.

Though she retired to Southwest County to be near family and because she didn't want to "grow old in the cold," Egertson is a highly sought education expert.

She still writes for several publications, is a consulting editor for others and speaks at venues around the country.

She also is helping six states develop early learning guidelines.

As to when she's finally going to give it all up, Egertson isn't quite sure when she's going to retire for good.

"I haven't figured out when that would be," she said. "As long as interesting things keep popping up and I can get on an airplane, I don't know."

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