One of the most important trends in education policy -- or indeed, in social policy -- is the attention being paid in many parts of the country to early childhood education. It's becoming clearer every day that an earlier focus on cognitive development and other "school readiness" skills can have an enormous impact on how well children perform when they enter K-12 schools -- especially those poor and minority children in danger of being left behind because of a variety of disadvantages they and their families face.
So far, just three states have taken the step of moving toward a system of statewide, voluntary pre-K education services for all four-year-olds: Georgia, New York, and Oklahoma. And a new study by researchers at Georgetown University highlights certain features of Oklahoma's program -- especially its emphasis on high teacher quality and school readiness -- that appear to be having an especially strong positive impact on kids who participate. While there are many routes states can take to get to universal preschool, Oklahoma has used the public school system to offer preschool to all 4-year-olds whose families want it, by giving public school districts state per-pupil funds for each 4-year-old they enroll in pre-kindergarten.
The study, which concentrated on Tulsa, found that Oklahoma's pre-K initiative generated significant improvements in cognitive and language assessments for participants in the program, with particularly strong impacts for Hispanic and low-income children relative to a control group of non-participants. (For more on the study, see the Progressive Policy Institute's recent 21st Century Schools Project Bulletin.) According to Education Week, test scores for Hispanic children increased by 54 percent, and for African-American children by 17 percent. Looking at the results by economic status, the study found that students eligible for free lunches achieved a 31 percent increase in cognitive skills, a 15 percent increase in motor skills, and an 18 percent increase in language skills.
What makes the Oklahoma pre-K program different from many others? In an area where there's often confusion among various goals, including child care, social services, and educational/cognitive training, Oklahoma has decided to focus squarely on a mission of developing school readiness skills. Teachers are required to hold a bachelor's degree and an early childhood education certificate, and are paid the same as K-12 teachers. And the programs are guided and evaluated by school readiness standards.
The attention now being paid to Oklahoma's pre-K program by national researchers and educational policy analysts is welcome and long overdue. First launched in 1998 through legislation sponsored by Democratic state legislators Joe Eddings and Penny Williams, the initiative drew strong bipartisan support. It now has a prominent champion in Oklahoma First Lady Kim Henry, a former elementary school teacher. She helped establish a public-private Oklahoma Partnership for School Readiness, set up by legislation signed by Gov. Brad Henry after it was vetoed by former Republican Gov. Frank Keating. "Recent scientific evidence proves that children who are prepared for school when they begin kindergarten are more likely to display stronger reading skills, more likely to graduate and more likely to become productive members of the workforce," said Mrs. Henry.
Oklahoma's school-based approach may not be the answer for all states, but its impacts and focus on teacher quality and school readiness standards offer lessons for local, state, and national policymakers. The Oklahoma experience is also germane to the national debate over the right mix of educational and social services in early childhood for disadvantaged children. This ought to be a topic of debate in the presidential election as well; how to best target education dollars in this area is just as important as the adequacy of funding levels.
Disadvantaged kids need a lot of help in a lot of areas, but getting them ready for the intellectual demands of school should come first.
