Our goal as an agency
is to get 90% of Washington’s children to be “ready for kindergarten,” and
to have race and family income not be predictors of readiness.
About 20% of
Washington’s children are in families at or below 110% of the federal poverty level
(FPL,) or about $24,000 for a family of four. These young people face
many challenges in life and are a key part of any rational economic strategy
for the state, as well as being part of the paramount duty enshrined in
Washington’s constitution. The large gap seen in our kindergarten entry
assessment between kids below 110% and their more advantaged peers persists
through their entire experience in the K-12 system, and the rest of their
lives.
We’re looking at a
number of ways to help these kids get ready for kindergarten. The most
effective in national data and in Washington is high-quality preschool. Without
that investment, we estimate that about 28% of this group will arrive in
kindergarten meeting our benchmark for kindergarten readiness. 28% isn’t 90%.
Sometimes you can
have too much of a good thing. Say – ice cream. When it comes to high-quality
preschool experiences – not so much. Dosage matters. There are three major
components of “dosage,” the amount of preschool a kid gets. Length of
day, number of years, and length of year.
ECEAP today is mostly
a half-day program – about 3 hours. Most national research suggests that a
full-day program is much more successful in getting kids ready for
kindergarten.[1] There are other reasons full-day makes a
lot of sense, which I’ll cover later.
We also have strong
data supporting high quality preschool for both three and four year olds.
- After one year of ECEAP, about 55%
are ready when we measure in June. When we measure in the fall the number
falls to about 35%. We attribute this falloff to both summer learning
loss, a problem well explored in the literature[2]and some testing differences between
ECEAP and kindergarten.
- A small fraction of kids start
when they are three, getting two years of ECEAP. 69% of those kids are
ready for kindergarten. 69% is a lot closer to 90% than 55% is.
Only a very small
fraction of kids in ECEAP have summer programming, and it’s too new for us to
have enough data to evaluate the effect. We’re super-interested in figuring out
how to prevent the large drop of scores over the summer, and this year’s budget
includes funds for a reasonable experiment to measure the effect of providing
the service all summer. This would inform future investment decisions.
One
of my particular concerns about ECEAP is that we’re not getting to the kids at
the highest risk. Over 60% of the families below 110% of the federal poverty
level (FPL) are headed by single parents, but only 42% of ECEAP families are.
There are lots of potential reasons for this, but the most likely is that a
half-day program is crazy making for single parents. What are you going to do
in the middle of the day – tell your boss you need time off to switch your kid
from one place to the other?
 |
| Ross Hunter at an ECEAP site. |
We don’t have another
intervention that works this well at getting kids ready for kindergarten, and
if we’re serious about ensuring that kids from low income families have the
same chance to succeed in school as their friends that are born closer to
opportunity then we have to design the preschool experience so that it actually
works for Washington families.
Governor Inslee’s
ECEAP budget proposal in front of the Legislature right now:
- Continues to expand ECEAP, but
with almost all full and extended-day slots. Washington law says that all
kids below 110% FPL will be entitled to a slot in the fall of 2020, and
Governor Inslee’s budget calls for a significant expansion in the next two
years so that we’re not scrambling to try to do it all at once in the next
budget cycle.
- Funds a substantive experiment in
summer programming so we can determine which particular model works best
to reach our kindergarten readiness goals.
- Continues eligibility for both
three and four year old children, because without this we are unlikely to
make our 90% goal and will be living with an opportunity gap for the next
generation of kids, something we think is morally repugnant.
In one of my favorite
turns of phrase this year, it’s pretty clear from national data that kids
really need to spend more time each day in the somatosensory bath[3] of the high-quality preschool and
intervention services that ECEAP provides. Research is emerging that indicates
more time in high quality preschool each day equals better results for the kids
who need it most.[4]
So in short, dosage
matters and more is better for ECEAP. Some questions we’re still exploring in order
to best steward the public funds in our trust while getting the best outcomes
for kids:
- What is the best combination of
length of day, number of years, and type of summer programming to get the
most children ready for kindergarten?
- Which children benefit the most
from the three elements above?
- ECEAP is more than just classroom
time. The variety of family supports and health coordination the program
provides are a critical part of its success. Not all families need every
type of support available. What types and levels of services each family
needs, and how to determine that efficiently, is a question we took up in
our Family Support Pilot and will continue to examine.
- What other factors are affecting
kindergarten readiness: availability of dual-language instruction, family
involvement in various parts of the child welfare system, seamless
transitions from effective early intervention programs like Early Head
Start, ESIT, and home visiting to high quality preschool programs like
ECEAP?
We don’t have a
perfect formula for dosage yet, but we have the tools to devise a good one.
Most importantly, we need to support and expand ECEAP in a thoughtful and
effective manner. I’ll be writing more about how DEL plans to implement ECEAP
expansion in the coming weeks, so keep an eye out for that post.
Sincerely,
Ross Hunter
Director, Washington State Department of Early Learning
[1] (Kenneth B. Robin, 2006)
[2] Wikipedia “Summer learning loss” https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Summer_learning_loss
[3] Somatosensory “of or relating to sensations that involve
parts of the body not associated with the primary sense organs.” James Heckman
writes about the importance of the somatosensory bath of early childhood here: http://bostonreview.net/archives/BR37.5/ndf_james_heckman_social_mobility.php
[4] RAND 2016, “Informing Investments in Preschool Quality and
Access in Cincinnati”, http://www.rand.org/pubs/research_reports/RR1461.html
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