Investing in high quality preschool: lessons from an urban setting

Abstract

Large numbers of children of low income families in the United States arrive at kindergarten already far behind their more affluent peers on measures of school readiness. In the absence of any federal preschool policy and amidst alarm about this growing divide, universal prekindergarten (UPK) programs have been launched around the United States, at both the state and local levels, to address the school readiness gap. Invest in Children, a public/private partnership in Cuyahoga County (Cleveland, OH) launched a UPK program of high quality, affordable preschool nine years ago. The program’s creation, implementation and challenges are discussed along with evaluation findings that document its positive impact on school readiness. Lessons learned are discussed in terms of the impact of political and economic shifts, as well as state policy changes, on this local program. The program’s planned expansion and enhancements to program design and evaluation are also described.

Keywords:

• Early childhood
• prekindergarten
• school readiness
• preschool

Acknowledgements

The authors wish to acknowledge the UPK providers and families participating in the UPK program for their commitment to the development of young children and the evaluation of the UPK program. We are grateful to the leadership of Cuyahoga County government and the taxpayers of Cuyahoga County, Ohio who have made the UPK program and its evaluation possible. We are also very thankful for the contributions from our philanthropic partners: The George Gund Foundation, PNC Bank and The Cleveland Foundation.

Notes

1. Among the sample of UPK children, 963 records had suppressed names, 279 records had no UPK attendance data, 2071 children lived outside Cleveland, and 920 children had no KRA-L score in CMSD data.

2. Consistent participation (‘high dose’) is defined as a child being enrolled in UPK for 9 months or more and having at least 16 days of enrollment per month (average or 4 days per week). Fully 75% of UPK children receive a ‘high dose’ of UPK experience.