The Longer-Term Effects of a Universal Pre-Kindergarten Program.” Working paper

Only three states currently fund a pre-kindergarten (PK) program for all four-year-olds. Other states and localities offer PK programs for low-income children, but interest in growing in offering expanded access to all children. Some research evidence is available on the effectiveness of targeted PK, but little information is available regarding the longer-term effects of universal PK programs. In this research, I will analyze a number of outcomes through the third grade for a group of children who attended a universal PK program in the Tulsa, Oklahoma, public schools in 2000-01. All data needed to complete the analysis are not yet available; thus this paper provides some initial descriptive statistics and describes the methods that will be used to estimate effects of the program. Attention is increasingly being focused on the role of early childhood education in later educational and labor market outcomes. Almost all states now fund some kind of pre-kindergarten (PK) education (almost always targeted to low-income children), and research and policy interest is growing in universal PK programs. Yet relatively little is known about the effectiveness of universal PK programs, the effectiveness for certain types of students, or why the programs are effective. The research described here aims to address this knowledge gap