Parental Choices of Early Care Settings and the Local Availability of Public School-Based Preschool

• In Event: Infant-Toddler Child Care Amidst Changing Policy Landscapes: Family Preferences, Preschool Expansion, and Provider Perspectives

Abstract

Parental choices of early care and education settings for their children depend on availability, preferences, and affordability. For preschool-aged children, publicly-funded preschool is widely available in some states but not others. We focus on the growing availability of public-school based preschools in many states and localities and ask how changes in the availability of preschool offered by public school districts affect parental choices with a focus on the implications for accessibility of care for infants and toddlers.

In this study, we examine how the roll out of preschools in public school settings corresponds to changes in parental choices for preschool-age children as well as for younger children who may have more difficulty finding center-based care if the prevalence of public-school preschool makes center-based care less profitable. Specifically, we ask the following research questions: (1) How do the characteristics of children differ across early care and education settings as the availability of preschool slots in nearby public schools varies over time? (2) Is there evidence of heterogeneity by child’s age, household income, poverty level in the local community area, and ethnicity?

We compare two nationally representative waves of data from the National Survey of Early Care and Education (NSECE) in 2012 and 2019 to examine how families’ use of early care and education changed over time. We look at predictors of early education and care arrangements for four- and five-year-old children not yet in kindergarten. We also use the Common Core of Data (CCD) which collects information on preschool enrollment in public school settings. We use the restricted NSECE data to get information on household locations and match that with CCD to measure the prevalence of public school-based preschool in each household’s neighborhood. Preliminary results show that the total number of preschoolers enrolled in public school sites increased by 11% between 2012 and 2019 but this increase had significant geographical variation.

As a number of states and local governments invest heavily in funding public preschool while others do not, how does the availability of public school-based preschool affect parental choices across these differing policy contexts? Findings are of great importance in understanding how one type of public investment in early education may affect parental choices. Our current arrangement of early education has been described as a patchwork system in which more coordination across levels of government and types of providers is important for ensuring that policies do not have adverse effects on other parts of the early childhood landscape. This research fits well with the 2025 APPAM conference theme of the importance of collaboration for policy solutions.

Authors

• Judy A Temple, University of Minnesota
  Presenting Author

• Sangyoo Lee, University of Nebraska Medical Center
  Non-Presenting Co-Author

• Irma Arteaga, University of Missouri-Columbia
  Non-Presenting Co-Author