The problem isn't that the parents don't "prepare" their children,
the problem is that the teachers don't teach the children.
Bilingual programs are also a big factor.
there shouldn't be any bilingual teaching.
Our culture uses English,
and that's what the kids need
to function in our society.
Even if parents use a public school, most of the teaching is the responsibility of the parents. The teachers are a small part. Parents owe it to their children to teach them basic language skills ---vocabulary and grammar, teach them colors, numbers, letters and many life skills before they send them to kindergarden. A child from an educated middle class family gets all that, but there are many children coming from homes that provide no education. A friend of mine worked in an Episcopalean Sunday School with kids who had all the educational toys, books, educated parents ---but in public school she saw kids who had many siblings, no toys, no books, no crayons and no language skills --also no health care, poor dental hygiene, unwed uneducated single mothers. I think that makes a large gap that most kids can't get across ----even with huge social programs like Head Start.