Pre-K Picks

Dear Supporter,

This issue should have something for everyone. A number of the resources below examine early education in different contexts, including rural communities, charter schools, and family child care homes while others address the transition from pre-k to later grades. Lastly, several items focus on recent policy proposals and changes and the advocacy efforts that led to them.

I attended the National Smart Start Conference this month and will include resources and insights in the next issue of Pre-K Picks.

Warm Regards,
Albert Wat
State Policy Analyst
Pre-K Now

What's your top resource pick to use in next month's newsletter? E-mail me at awat@preknow.org.

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The Prime Pick Leadership Matters – especially in tight fiscal times Half of the states are facing budget shortfalls as they enter a new fiscal year. While this gloomy outlook has slowed the growing support of pre-k in governors' offices, it certainly has not stopped it. In our annual report on gubernatorial budget recommendations "Leadership Matters", Pre-K Now found that in spite of significant fiscal and political challenges, 16 governors and the mayor of Washington, D.C. proposed a total of $261 million in increases for FY09 pre-k programs. Leading the pack are Governor Riley, a Republican from Alabama, and Governor Richardson, a Democrat from New Mexico, who proposed pre-k budget increases of 174 percent and 76 percent, respectively. But the fiscal constraints have taken a toll: For the first time in four years, the number of executives proposing increases for pre-k declined. Governors in four states - California, Idaho, Rhode Island, and South Carolina - proposed cuts to state funding for pre-k or Head Start.

Pick Positions NCSL resources track early care and education legislation Study analyzes availability of early care and education in rural New York Brief argues that charter schools can support high-quality pre-k Policy and data resources for aligning pre-k through third grade Report summarizes lessons for early childhood advocates Harvard center provides a layperson's guide to early childhood program evaluation Developing a common understanding of early childhood professional development Toolkit helps educators facilitate transition into kindergarten NACCRRA study finds standards and oversight for small family child care homes "weak at best" Report examines trends in early childhood well-being States take action on Early Head Start

Trends in four governors pre-k proposals, measured by proposed percent change in pre-k funding As shown by their pre-k proposals for the last four fiscal years, the governors of Alabama and Tennessee backed up their words with action while the governors of California and Missouri chose inconsistency and inaction.

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1. NCSL resources track early care and education legislation

The National Council of State Legislatures (NCSL) recently launched a new database to help track a wide range of early care and education legislation introduced in the 50 states and the District of Columbia. Topics include pre-k, child care, Head Start, home visiting, financing, and professional development. The user can search by the bill’s title, sponsor, status, or number.

NCSL also released a report on states' budget actions for pre-k, child care, home visiting, and other early learning programs such as Head Start/Early Head Start and early childhood mental health services. They found that between FY07 and FY08, state general fund appropriations for these programs increased by $1.2 billion, for a total of $13.6 billion: $8.46 billion for child care, $4.5 billion for pre-k, $31 million for home visiting, and $347 million for other programs. Of the $1.2 billion increase, more than half was allotted for child care. Another 45 percent of the allocated budget supported pre-k. Even though the increase for child care was the largest among the four types of programs, most of it came from one state (California), and the increase made up for a decrease of Temporary Assistance to Needy Families (TANF) funds that states transferred to child care programs between FY07 and FY08.

The report includes state-by-state tables detailing FY07 and FY08 appropriations for these early care and education programs.

2. Study analyzes availability of early care and education in rural New York

A recent study from Cornell University demonstrates that even when the size, wealth, and education level of a community are taken into consideration, rural communities throughout New York still have less capacity to serve their young children than their suburban or urban counterparts. The study analyzed the availability of five types of early care and education arrangements in rural New York: center-based infant care (birth to 18 months), center-based toddler care (18 to 36 months), center-based care for three and four year olds, state pre-k, and family child care. The study examined 17,000 early childhood programs in 700 districts and 62 counties and discovered:

• Altogether, the five types of programs only have the capacity to serve a quarter of all eligible children in the counties studied.

• In non-rural counties, most early childhood slots were located in center-based programs. In rural counties, most were located in family child care and pre-k programs. This appears to be partly related to the wealth and education of the residents in these communities.

• When analyzed by need of the school districts (e.g., education level of adult residents, rate of child poverty, per-capita income, etc.), rural districts with high need have the least capacity to serve their young children. For instance, compared with high need urban and suburban districts, which have enough pre-k slots to serve about 40 percent of all eligible children, high need rural districts can only serve about 30 percent of them.

• School districts with more space, poorer students, and higher enrollment are more likely to provide pre-k than smaller districts that serve more well-to-do students.

New York City was not part of the sample of school districts in the study.

3. Brief argues that charter schools can support high-quality pre-k

A new brief from Democrats for Education Reform argues that charter schools are natural partners for pre-k because of their shared challenges and approaches to education. Among similarities cited, both charter schools and pre-kindergarten programs involve providers other than traditional public schools to deliver programs. Both are also often challenged by limited facilities and other infrastructure costs.

Charter schools can potentially bring a number of assets to the early childhood community. Many have access to funding resources that can support pre-k programs as well as experience with rigorous accountability standards and alignment with K-12. This type of information is critical for ensuring quality in pre-k programs.

The brief offers a number of recommendations that would make it easier for charter schools to participate in state pre-k programs and give them access to state and federal funds. It also includes profiles of pre-k programs in charter schools throughout the country.

4. Policy and data resources for aligning pre-k through third grade

There is increasing recognition that academic success partially depends on the coordination and alignment of expectations and practices in the elementary, middle, secondary, and post-secondary school years. A recent article argues that the years between pre-k and third grade should be the "cornerstone" of the "P-16" education continuum and describes what P-3 alignment should look like.

The goal of a P-3 approach would go beyond school readiness; it aims to maintain the gains made during pre-k and help children achieve academic proficiency by third grade. This would require changing how educators and policymakers work at every level, from the student experience to practices within schools to policies set by districts and states.

If implemented, district and state policies that align standards, curriculum, and assessment at every grade within the P-3 years would ensure that learning and accomplishments from one year inform and serve as the foundation for work in the next. Importantly, alignment does not only mean that K-3 standards would influence what happens in pre-k classrooms. It opens up the possibility of extending pre-k standards not typically included in elementary grades (e.g. social-emotional development) in the first through third grades. The article includes action steps to move toward a P-3 approach, including raising awareness, convening stakeholders, and reforming teacher education. Another brief, from the Education Commission of the States, provides additional information on P-3 alignment.

To encourage research on the benefits of a P-3 approach, the PK-3 initiative at the Foundation for Child Development has created the PK-3 Data Resource Center. This clearinghouse for data and reports related to the alignment of standards, curricula, and assessments from pre-k through third grade provides access to a number of datasets, including the Early Childhood Longitudinal Study - Kindergarten (ECLS-K), the National Head Start/Public School Early Childhood Transition Demonstration Study, the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth, and the Panel Study of Income Dynamics.

5. Report summarizes lessons for early childhood advocates

A new report by Voices for America’s Children documents ten states’ lessons learned from advocacy successes during the 2007 legislative session. Issues discussed within the report include pre-k, child care, full-day kindergarten, quality rating systems, and early childhood professional development. Developing a focused policy agenda, instead of trying to do too many things at once, was among the report’s many recommendations. Other lessons related to coalition building, messaging, grassroots mobilization, and cultivating relationships with elected officials and the media were included in the report.

“Increasing State Investments in Early Care and Education,” features profiles of the “wins” and strategies used in each of the ten states documented: Alabama, Colorado, Missouri, New Mexico, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Virginia, Washington, Wisconsin, and Wyoming.

6. Harvard center provides a layperson's guide to early childhood program evaluation

The Center on the Developing Child at Harvard University has produced an easy-to-understand guide to help policymakers interpret and assess the quality of early childhood program evaluations. It helps the reader to answer five key questions:

• Is the evaluation design strong enough to produce trustworthy evidence? This section explains the relative merits between experimental designs and other approaches, such as the regression discontinuity design.

• What program services were actually received by participating children and families and comparison groups? In order to be valid, the evaluation should ensure that the program was implemented as intended and served the intended population.

• How much impact did the program have? This section defines terms such as effect sizes, statistical significance, "intent to treat" impacts, and "treatment on the treated" impacts.

• Do the program's benefits exceed its costs? The most powerful intervention may not be the wisest investment, and this section explains why.

• How similar are the programs, children and families in the study to those in your constituency or community? This section provides guidance for what lessons, if any, can be applied as the result of an evaluation.

7. Developing a common understanding of early childhood professional development

The early childhood profession is diverse in terms of roles (e.g., teachers, administrators, care providers, paraprofessionals, mental health specialists) and affiliations (e.g., Head Start, pre-k, child care, public school). Professional development for the field - its content, format, and approach - is just as diffuse. To develop a common understanding of what professional development in the early childhood field should entail, the National Professional Development Center on Inclusion (NPDCI) has put forth a framework to help trainers and other decision-makers determine what is needed to create effective professional development experiences. The framework guides the reader through three components:

• The “Who”: the adult learners and their contexts, including their qualifications, personal backgrounds, and work environment.

• The “What”: The desired knowledge and skills for the learners to develop and how they are related to research, state policies, and expected child and family outcomes.

• The “How”: best practices or research-based methods for professional development.

NPDCI also developed a worksheet to facilitate the implementation of this framework.

8. Toolkit helps educators facilitate transition into kindergarten

Get Ready to Read, an initiative of the National Center for Learning Disabilities, has created a school readiness toolkit for educators. It includes examples of a readiness indicators checklist, an observation guide, an early literacy screening tool, and other Spanish and English resources to engage parents as partners in school readiness preparation. The toolkit also defines the benchmarks of a successful transition to kindergarten including:

• Children liking and looking forward to school.

• Children showing steady growth in academic skills.

• Parents maintaining involvement in their children's education.

• Teachers knowing the child's parents and family members.

• Parents trusting teachers to understand their children's needs and to value their involvement.

• Schools, parents, community-based and social service organizations collaborating to facilitate a successful transition.

While the toolkit offers checklists and worksheets that educators can readily use, teachers should take care to adapt these tools for their own contexts by making sure the indicators are aligned with the early learning standards in their state or district.

9. NACCRRA study finds standards and oversight for small family child care homes “weak at best”

Of the 12.5 million children under six who are placed in child care centers every week, about 1.7 million of them - more than 13 percent - spend their day in small family child care homes (defined as homes that care for up to six children). Unfortunately, according to a study by the National Association of Child Care Resource and Referral Agencies (NACCRRA), states have lax standards and oversight for these far-reaching settings. In their state-by-state review, 15 states received a score of zero because they do not inspect family child care homes before licensing, they allow more than six children in the home without regulation, or they do not license small programs.

The study examined 14 elements of quality including practices and standards related to licensing, monitoring, health, safety, staff qualifications and training, learning activities and materials, group size, and family involvement. Of all the states studied, Oklahoma scored the highest, receiving 75 percent of all points possible.

In general, NACCRRA found states deficient in many of the documented areas. Most states' policies addressed some of the safety and health standards, but only eight required programs to follow all ten basic standards in both areas. Other important findings noted within the study include:

• 29 states have no minimum education requirement for small family child care providers. Only two states go so far as to require some college level courses in early childhood education.

• 11 states have no pre-service training requirement for small family care providers. Twenty others require up to ten hours of pre-service training, about enough for an initial CPR and first aid certification.

• Only about half the states require family care providers to have learning materials to support language and literacy development. Even fewer states require materials for other areas of cognitive development.

The study provides recommendations for states and federal agencies to increase their regulation and monitoring of family child care providers and for the federal government to increase child care funding to help states implement quality improvements.

10. Report examines trends in early childhood well-being

The Child Well-Being Index, created by a collaboration between the Foundation for Child Development and Duke University, tracks about 25 indicators of well-being for children at three stages of development: early childhood (birth through five), middle childhood (six through 11), and adolescence (12 through 18). The latest report focuses on trends during the first two periods of childhood using data compiled from 1994 to 2006. It found that the overall welfare of both age groups has improved over the past two decades, just as it did for adolescents. For the early childhood years, improvements included a dramatic 40 percent increase in enrollment in full-day kindergarten since 1994, a 26 percent enrollment increase in early childhood programs for three and four year olds, and decreases in infant mortality, blood lead poisoning, and mothers smoking during pregnancy.

While the report had generally positive news, there were signs of concerns, including a rise in low-birth-weight babies as well as in early childhood obesity. The authors also noted that the worsening economic picture for many families could erode some of the progress observed in this study.

The study organizes the indicators for well-being into six categories: family economic well-being, health, safety, social/family relationships, educational attainment, and community connectedness. The analysis shows an increase in early childhood well-being since the beginning of this decade for community connectedness and safety. During the same period, there was a decline in health indicators for this age group, with relatively little change in family economic well-being, educational attainment and social/family relationships.

11. States take action on Early Head Start

The 2007 reauthorization of Head Start requires that half of all new funding for the program be used to expand Early Head Start (EHS). This program provides low-income pregnant women, infants, toddlers, and their families a variety of home-based and center-based services including health care and screenings, parent support and education, child care, and prenatal health care and support. While the proposed FY09 federal budget does not include any increases for Head Start, a new joint report from the Center for Law and Social Policy (CLASP) and ZERO TO THREE finds that 20 states are acting on their own to build on EHS. Most of these state initiatives increase access to EHS and/or extend the length of the program day or year. More recently, a smaller number of states have provided resources and assistance to center-based and home-based care providers to improve overall program quality and expand delivery capacity to EHS services.

The report includes basic information on each state's initiatives and discusses program features such as governance, funding, collaboration with community providers and federal agencies, quality standards, and monitoring and evaluation. It also provides recommendations for states to address the challenges programs face in implementing EHS - stagnant federal funding, lack of qualified staff, start-up costs, managing collaborations and conflicting regulations, and lack of support or awareness among elected officials.