Improving State-Sponsored Pre-Kindergarten Evaluations Through the Analysis of Student Enrollment Feeder Patterns

• In Event: 31.091 - Roundtable Session 10
  In Roundtable Session: 31.091-13 - Evaluating P–12 Programs and Strategies

Abstract

Connecticut is the third largest spender in the country on prekindergarten programming, yet it has the largest achievement gap across all 50 states. As part of a larger state-wide evaluation employing the use of regression discontinuity (RD) to estimate the effect of attending state-funded preschool programs, a feeder analysis was used to understand how students across the state sort into prekindergarten programs and into kindergarten both to inform study sampling efforts and to check assumptions central to the quality of RD designs. Feeder pattern results indicate that students sorted into programs in systematic ways that needed to be carefully attended to during RD implementation, suggesting a source of potential bias not previously identified in prior evaluations of preschool programming.

Authors

• Bianca Montrosse-Moorhead, University of Connecticut

• Shaun Michael Dougherty, University of Connecticut

• Tamika Patrice La Salle, Georgia State University

• Jennifer Freeman, University of Connecticut

• Jennie Weiner, University of Connecticut

• Hannah M. Dostal, University of Connecticut