Preschool may be good at offering short-term academic gains for kids, but a program that provided services from preschool through 3rd grade showed benefits for children that boosted their college attendance rates years later, finds a new study in JAMA Pediatrics.
Researchers examined the life outcomes of nearly 1,000 children who attended the Chicago Child-Parent Centers as preschoolers in the early 1980s. Among CPC children who only stayed long enough to complete preschool, 15.7 percent received an associate degree or higher, compared to 10.7 percent of children in a comparison group who didn’t attend that particular program.
For children who stayed in the Child-Parent Center until 2nd or 3rd grade, 18.5 percent received a master’s degree or higher, compared to 12.5 percent in the comparison group.
