From Demonstration Project to Full-Blown Early Education Policy: Lessons Still to Be Learned

• In Event: Moscone Center West Roundtable Session 9
  In Roundtable Session: Comparative Perspectives on Scaling Early Childhood

Abstract

In keeping with the 2020 AERA theme and Division L’s focus on policy implementation and going to scale, our paper describes how a modest demonstration project in early years education became the blueprint for scaling up to full-blown full-day kindergarten policy by way of community, school and university research collaboration. We explore one of North America’s most ambitious early childhood education programs - universal two-year, play-based, full-day kindergarten for 4 and 5 year olds in Ontario - in terms of design principles and lessons learned from the demonstration project that inspired it. While our findings show the long-term value of FDK, they also show that there are unfulfilled possibilities for supporting families and the professional teams that deliver the program.

Authors

• Janette P. Pelletier, University of Toronto

• Carl M. Corter, University of Toronto - OISE

• Sejal Patel, Ryerson University