Florida Amendment 8, 4-Year-Old Pre-Kindergarten Initiative (2002)

Florida Amendment 8
Election date November 5, 2002
Topic Early childhood education
Status Approved
Type Initiated constitutional amendment	Origin Citizens

Florida Amendment 8 was on the ballot as an initiated constitutional amendment in Florida on November 5, 2002. It was approved.

A “yes” vote supported requiring that all four-year-old children be offered the ability to attend pre-kindergarten for free.

A “no” vote opposed requiring that all four-year-old children be offered the ability to attend pre-kindergarten for free.

Election results

Florida Amendment 8
Result		Votes	Percentage
Yes		2,868,500	59.23%
No		1,974,408	40.77%

Results are officially certified.

Source

Text of measure

Ballot title

The ballot title for Amendment 8 was as follows:

“

Every four-year-old child in Florida shall be offered a high quality pre-kindergarten learning opportunity by the state no later than the 2005 school year. This voluntary early childhood development and education program shall be established according to high quality standards and shall be free for all Florida four-year-olds without taking away funds used for existing education, health and development programs.

”

Full Text

The full text of this measure is available here.

Constitutional changes

The text of the amendment read:

(b) Every four-year old child in Florida shall be provided by the Stat e a high quality pre-kindergarten learning opportunity in the form of an early childhood development and education program which shall be voluntary, high quality, free, and delivered according to professionally accepted standards. An early childhood development and education program means an organized program designed to address and enhance each child's ability to make age appropriate progress in an appropriate range of settings in the development of language and cognitive capabilities and emotional, social, regulatory and moral capacities through education in basic skills and such other skills as the Legislature may determine to be appropriate. (c) The early childhood education and development programs provided by reason of subparagraph (b) shall be implemented no later than the beginning of the 2005 school year through funds generated in addition to those used for existing education, health, and development programs. Existing education, health, and development programs are those funded by the State as of January 1, 2002 that provided for child or adult education, health care, or development.

Path to the ballot

See also: Signature requirements for ballot measures in Florida

The ballot measure was an initiated constitutional amendment. Proponents collected signatures to place the initiative on the ballot.

See also

2002 Measures

• 2002 Measures
• Early childhood education on the ballot
• 2002 legislative sessions

Florida

• Florida ballot measures
• Florida ballot measure laws

News and analysis

• Ballot measure lawsuits
• Ballot measure readability
• Ballot measure polls

External links

• Florida Division of Elections, "Initiatives / Amendments / Revisions Database"