Guests: Rob Grunewald, associate economist at the Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis; Arthur J. Rolnick, senior vice president and director of research at the Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis; and Sara Watson, senior officer, state policy initiatives at The Pew Charitable Trusts.
Kevin Bushweller (Moderator):
Welcome to today's online chat about the connections between early-childhood education and K-12 learning.
We have many questions waiting to be answered, so let's get the discussion started ...
Rob Grunewald:
Some guidelines and standards can be helpful for pre-k, but too much emphasis on standards can also impede flexibility for programs. There is a healthy balance to find; however, it seems that more often the err is on too many requirements.
While assigning grades to pre-k children is questionable, assessments of pre-k children play in important role in measuring progress in cognitive and social-emotional development.
Concerns have been raised about using, or not using, child outcome measures. On one hand, some ECD professionals have raised concerns about tying child outcomes to program funding or financial incentives. They point out that it’s difficult to measure the progress of a child’s development since it is complex and influenced by environments other than the ECD program, particularly the child’s home environment. On the other hand, some prospective funders and policymakers have raised concerns over how they can know whether an ECD program is achieving desired results. They want to be sure their money and public funds that they advocate for are spent productively.
We feel that this tension regarding accountability – the difficulty inherent in measuring child outcomes and the use of this data to provide performance incentives – will ultimately be productive. There is strong demand for fair, comprehensive and cost-effective assessments of child outcomes. We feel that using this data to provide incentives for outcomes will attain desired results.
In 2006, 31 states increasing funding for prekindergarten by over $450 million, including states such as Texas, Tennessee and Louisiana - despite all its challenges. If they can, others can too.
States that are interested in help in putting together a public education campaign for prek can contact Pre-K Now for assistance on communications strategies and other advice (www.preknow.org) and the National Institute for Early Education Research (www.nieer.org) for good data.
Rob Grunewald:
High-quality early childhood development programs have the following elements:
-Well qualified staff. Teachers with more training have more effective interactions with children and produce stronger outcomes.
-Parent engagement.
-Relatively low ratios of children to teachers.
-Research-backed, child-focused curriculum.
Sara Watson:
Private providers can both provide an excellent education for children and give parents the range of choices that are necessary to suit their preferences and work requirements. Many state prekindergarten programs use private providers, either contracting with them directly or through the school system. According to a report by Pre-K Now, "A Diverse System Delivers for Pre-K," about one-third of children in state-funded pre-k programs nationwide are in community settings -- in New York State, the figure is 60%. Twenty-nine states use a diverse delivery system.
To ensure that all children receive the best possible education, state standards for providers should be high and should apply to all locations. The research is strong that a four-year college degree, with specialization in early childhood, is crucial to ensuring the best child outcomes. So that degree should be required of all pre-kindergarten teachers, along with continuing education to hone their skills. However, teachers who do not yet have that degree need support - scholarships, mentoring, etc. -- to help them attain it.
What is the main reason that the Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis has gotten involved with stimulating the growth of early childhood/pre-school education?
Arthur J. Rolnick:
The main reason the Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis got involved was our concern about long-term economic growth and its dependence on the development of human capital. Economic research suggests that a key element of sustainable economic growth is the development of human capital. Research shows that investments in early childhood development have the highest return.
Sara Watson:
To do this, we need to talk about early childhood as an investment, we need more business leaders as champions for early education, and we need to have the data that clearly document the economic returns to proven programs. Art Rolnick and Rob Grunewald's seminal piece is a great place to start.
And new data are starting to come in. The Trusts funded the Committee for Economic Development to produce a report on the economic returns to prek, called "The Economic Promise of Investing in High-Quality Preschool: Using Early Education to Improve Economic Growth and the Fiscal Sustainability of States and the Nation" available at www.ced.org/projects/educ.shtml. It shows that prek could generate more jobs than traditional economic development subsidies and that prek for all could boost economic growth by 3.5% by 2080.
Several other studies are available on the economic returns to individual state governments - see www.preknow.org and www.nieer.org. A forthcoming book by Robert Lynch of the Economic Policy Institute will provide a cash flow analysis for a prek program for every state.
In addition, the Trusts collaborated with 11 other funders to launch the Partnership for America's Economic Success (www.partnershipforsuccess.org), which is assessing the economic return of a variety of programs for children prenatal to five. New data will be emerging soon, and our annual national conference to engage business and share results is March 7 in Washington, D.C.
However, it can also have risks -- for example, it's important that curriculum is not just translated down from first grade or kindergarten instead of being developmentally appropriate for the younger children, prek should be linked to programs offering coverage for a full work day, inequitable financing for k-12 should not spill over into prek. And it's especially vital that this approach not hurt the child care programs that provide essential nurturing and education for younger children. So ideally states would use the best of both worlds -- the stable funding and professionally supportive environment of k-12 with the responsiveness to parent needs and developmental nature of early childhood services -- along with ensuring that quality child care remains available for infants and toddlers.
Arthur J. Rolnick:
We encourage you to read the National Institute for Early Education Research’s state profiles on preschool programs, available at www.nieer.org.
How has the Pew Charitable Trusts supported pre-school education?
Sara Watson:
Over the past five years, the Trusts has invested over $58 million to support partners who have worked nationally and with local groups on behalf of preschool education. We have engaged over a dozen national and regional organizations directly, as well as supported public education campaigns in over half the states.
Our strategy is to identify states where the opportunity to advance prek is ripe, and then to provide the help needed to ensure that the best information informs policy debates. Our grantees have also worked at the federal level, for example, to enhance Head Start as the essential foundation of early education for poor children. We also support efforts to document progress, as with NIEER's annual Yearbook of State Pre-k Policy.
Our grantees include Pre-K Now, NIEER, the National Conference of State Legislatures, Fight Crime: Invest in Kids (engaging law enforcement), National School Boards Association, Committee for Economic Development (identifying business champions), the Hechinger Institute for Education and the Media at Columbia University and the Education Writers Association(reaching reporters), and the Education Law Center (to help K-12 lawsuits request prek as a remedy). We are always looking for new partners interested in spreading this message.
More information on the Trusts' strategy can be found at www.pewtrusts.org//pdf/pew_preK_article_0107.pdf.
Sara Watson:
The Foundation for Child Development has established an initiative to improve the education system from prek through third grade (PK-3), to ensure that the good start offered by prek continues to be supported through the early grades. Examples of communities that are working to improve those practices can be found at www.ffcd.org/PK3ResearchandProfiles.html.
Kindergarten transition planning was not a major part of the Perry Preschool design (see Lifetime Effects: The High/Scope Perry Preschool Study Through Age 40) but the program did operate in the public schools, with public school teachers, so some communication may have occurred.
Arthur J. Rolnick:
We don't know the answer to that question, but the problem you pose is the problem we are trying to fix.
Arthur J. Rolnick:
We think you need to begin to build trust at the earliest age possible. That is why we advocate providing parent mentors for at-risk parents as early as prenatal. With an engaged parent, working with a mentor, we think we can develop trust with children and with quality organizations.
Sara Watson:
No states have proposals to make prek mandatory in terms of attendance and I don't know of anyone that wants prek to be mandatory (including us). That's sometimes a "red herring" put out by those who oppose prek. Bear in mind that not all states require kindergarten attendance. We do hope that states will offer prek to all 3 and 4 year olds whose parents want it for them.
Funding most commonly comes from general revenue, with other common sources being the K-12 funding formula, lottery, gaming, tobacco settlement, cigarette or beer taxes. More info on funding prek is at http://www.preknow.org/documents/FundingtheFuture_Feb2006.pdf, while info on funding early care and education in general is at www.earlychildhoodfinance.org.
Sara Watson:
Massachusetts is making great strides in creating a high quality early education system, especially with the creation last year of the state Department of Early Education and Care.
This tension is difficult, but it will help if each system realizes that with the right support both can provide a high quality environment for children and both have essential roles to play. Public school programs can provide an infrastructure and professional development experience that can raise the quality of prek, and child care programs can provide excellent prek if they have the support, as well as meeting the needs of working parents and giving parents choices about where their children go to prek. They (along with family care) also are essential to providing good care for infants and toddlers.
The Center for Law and Social Policy has some good reports on the relationship between child care and prek, as well as on the early childhood system at www.clasp.org/publications.php?id=3#0.
Harold
As an economist what can you say about how pre-school/early childhood education will help the USA/world economies?
Rob Grunewald:
Economic research suggests that a key element of sustainable economic growth is the development of human capital. Research shows that investments in early childhood development have the highest return.
QUESTION: How much would it cost to provide screening and intervention for high risk babies who would have a home trainer attached to each child with the mission of teaching parents how to teach and provide the stimulation necessary for normal child development. Why aren't we looking at this? What would the impact be on violence for example?
Arthur J. Rolnick:
We agree, and we think that the costs for parent mentor services beginning prenatal are relatively modest considering their benefits, ranging between $1,000 to $3,000 per family annually.
Rob Grunewald:
Our approach is to ask the question somewhat differently. We approach the problem from the demand side, not the supply side. On the demand side we propose to provide every at-risk child with a parent mentor and scholarships to attend a high quality early childhood development program. The scholarships will be funded at a level to encourage quality programs, including high quality teachers. While we haven't estimated the cost of the program at a national level, for the state of Minnesota about $90 million annually would provide parent mentors and scholarships for every child living at or below the poverty line.
In terms of use of philanthropic dollars, there is always a need for resources to get good information into the policy debates that can affect large numbers of children over long periods of time. That's often the piece that is missing.
Sara Watson:
The National Institute for Early Education Research rates states on a 10 point quality checklist that is a good place to begin - www.nieer.org. You might add other elements that are particularly important to you.
Pre-K Now's recent poll of Latinos, "Pre-K and Latinos: The Foundation for America's Future" shows how much Hispanic families want prek for their children (www.preknow.org). Also the National Task Force on Early Childhood Education for Hispanics (ecehispanic.org) is an excellent resource.
Arthur J. Rolnick:
The Minnesota Department of Education has funded a school readiness assessment for three years. We encourage you to contact the department for details: http://children.state.mn.us/mde/index.html
Arthur J. Rolnick:
We are not aware of the particulars of this program, we have not doubt that there are a number of approaches to support early literacy. However, for the most at-risk children, reaching them early is key, through parent mentors, starting prenatal, and following up with high-quality early childhood development programs.
Rob Grunewald:
Longitudinal studies of early childhood interventions for at-risk children show that high school graduation rates are higher for children who participated in high-quality early ed programs compared with a comparison group of children who did not attend. Studies include Perry Preschool Project, Abecedarian, and Chicago Child-Parent Project. The research is summarized on the Minneapolis Fed Web site: http://www.minneapolisfed.org/research/studies/earlychild/
As a man specializing in research, what is the most important thing you get from the research that supports early childhood/pre-school education?
Arthur J. Rolnick:
We find the most recent research on brain development to be very persuasive. There is now little doubt that the environment affects brain development at a very early age. Indeed, the brain of a child living in a stressful environment does not develop properly and this lack of development shows up as early as age three.
Sara Watson:
Two years ago there was considerable debate around giving states more direct influence over Head Start (which is now funded directly from the federal government to local organizations), but those proposals were intensely controversial and did not succeed. Head Start is overdue for reauthorization and is expected to be debated next year, but it is not clear yet what the proposed changes will be.
Arthur J. Rolnick:
Two advocacy groups that have been successful in Minnesota include Ready4K (www.ready4k.org) and Minnesota Business for Early Learning (www.mnbel.org).
Sara Watson:
This is a big issue - it is just as challening and complex to teach 4 year olds as it is to teach 5 year olds!
State and local systems can help bridge this divide by, for example, offering pay, benefits and a career ladder to qualified prek teachers comparable to those for k-12; setting up rigorous professional development opportunities and requirements; and recognizing the best prek teachers right alongside the best k-12 teachers.
Community partnerships also can help EC programs in a variety of ways -- supplementing state funding with other resources; helping prek programs link parents to othe needed services; getting in-classroom help for particular needs, such as mental health specialists who can help with behavior problems; calling attention to the need for quality programs and publicizing the availability of programs so that parents sign up their children.
The opportunity that exists in every American public school to identify delays in the development of language, literacy, numeracy, sensory-motor and behavior skills in the first few years of school is not emphasized. Can you comment on how we can do more at this level as well?
Arthur J. Rolnick:
If the early childhood movement is successful, K-12 will have the opportunity to build on that success. Research shows that when children arrive at the kindergarten door prepared to learn, they are likely to succeed.
Rob Grunewald:
We have proposed here in Minnesota to build an endowed fund, the annual proceeds would provide parent mentors to parents of at-risk children and scholarships to attend high-quality early education programs. The endowed fund provides a permanent funding commitment. ECD providers compete to deliver high quality services to children and parents instead of competing for funding.
Arthur J. Rolnick:
In our market-driven approach, Head Start becomes one of several providers that can be eligible to receive children with scholarships. Ultimately, all eligible programs will be judged on their success for getting at-risk children ready for school. It's likely there will be a role for Early Head Start to support the parent mentoring part of our approach.
Rob Grunewald:
For our proposal we categorize at-risk as children living at the poverty level or below. Developmental psychologists have noted that other risk factors for young children include exposure to violence, neglect, parent chemical dependency, low education levels among parents and low-birth weight.
Arthur J. Rolnick:
We think the links between pre-K and K-12 have to be forged by engaged parents. That is why we advocate providing parent mentors for at-risk parents as early as prenatal. Furthermore, the scholarships we discuss provide incentives for early childhood development programs to produce strong child outcomes. We consider a strong outcome as a child ready to succeed in kindergarten. This is the way to forge these links.
Why did the Pew Charitable Trusts get involved with supporting pre-school education?
Sara Watson:
The Trusts believes that one effective way to invest its resources is by informing and advancing state and federal policies that benefit the public. There are many policy issues deserving of attention, but philanthropic dollars are limited, and deciding where to focus is a challenge. We begin to narrow the field by identifying important issues that also meet the following criteria:
-- There is a clear goal toward which to work, -- That goal is supported by objective, high quality research, -- The issue can generate broad support from the public, policy makers and a range of influential constituencies, and -- Measurable progress can be made toward the long-term goal in three to five years.
After many years of experience in the environment, education, health and human services arenas, we have learned that advancing policy goals takes time; significant resources; rigorous, nonpartisan research and sophisticated, focused public education campaigns.
In 2000-2001 Susan Urahn, director of state policy initiatives at the Trusts, undertook a long process to determine the research base behind pre-k. Because of the compelling nature of the data and how this initiative fit the other criteria above, in 2001, the Trusts' board decided to launch its multi-year initiative with the goal of advancing voluntary, high-quality pre-k for three- and four-year-olds.
This choice was NOT meant to imply that other supports for children are unimportant, or that prek is the magic answer. Health care, care for infants and toddlers, etc., are also vital. It's just that this piece fit our criteria, so our philosophy is to achieve what we can here and then move on to the next thing for kids. Some of the states that we have supported are able to package prek with other essential supports - for example Illinois won prek for all 3s and 4s while also using prek's lead message to increase funding for even younger children. That's ideal.
Sara Watson:
It is wonderful to see how Governor Kaine, like Gov. Warner before him, has make pre-k a major priority. Leaders such as Rob Dugger and Paul Hirschbiel, co-chairs of the previous Virginia Early Learning Commission, and as well as the leaders of the Start Strong Preschool Council, including chair Katherine Busser of Capital One, are truly making an enormous difference for the state's children. Their great early report is available at www.education.virginia.gov/Initiatives/StartStrong/
StartStrong-InitialReport.pdf.
Improving the quality of teaching for young children requires a multi-faceted approach -- state standards for teacher qualifications, schools of higher education that offer instruction in early education (not just kindergarten and older children), alignment between 2- and 4-year colleges so that teachers can build on AA degrees, scholarships to help staff with low salaries afford tuition, mentoring to help them navigate through the higher education system, accessible education (either through online learning or other strategies to reach across the state), etc. Ongoing workshops are also essential - and a nice way for early childhood systems to collaborate is to open workshops to all early childhood teachers in the state, regardless of the program in which they teach.
An example of how New Jersey moved virtually all of its prek teaching force to BA degrees can be found at http://www.acnj.org/admin.asp?uri=2081&action=15&di=298&ext= pdf&view=yes.
The National Assn for the Education of Young Children has also developed a conceptual framework for professional develoment at: http://www.naeyc.org/about/positions/psconf98.asp
But the underpinning to all of this work must be salary and benefit packages that make early education an attractive career, particularly in comparision to k-12 teaching. All of the incentives in the world won't help if teaching young children remains a dramatically under-paid, ill-supported career.
This chat is now over. A transcript will be posted shortly on edweek.org
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