A recent column by Phil Power, the president of the Center for Michigan, which describes itself as a “centrist think-and-do tank,” has a message that resonates beyond that Midwestern state.

“One of the things that gets people maddest about the way government works is when we know something is true, and the authorities do the opposite, time and time again,” Phil Power writes in the Holland [MI] Sentinel. “It is beyond dispute that children learn the quickest and best from birth to age 5. When do we usually start spending a lot of public money on educating our children? At age 5, when they enter kindergarten.”

Citing research on the long-lasting benefits of Michigan’s Great Start Readiness Program, Power supports efforts to revise Michigan’s School Aid Act include prekindergarten. “Early childhood programs available to all,” he writes, “could be an absolute game-changer for Michigan kids — and for Michigan employers, who are complaining loudly about not being able to find skilled employees.”