Creating a Climate for Early Learning: How State Policy is Associated with School Readiness

• In Event: 523 - Section on Sociology of Education Refereed Roundtable Session and Business Meeting
  In Refereed Roundtable 60min: Table 20. Early Education

Abstract

In trying to ensure that children have equal opportunities to be ready for school, state and federal governments have increasingly invested resources in strengthening early childhood education and the availability of programs to children. This study argues that the educational climate created in a state via a variety of early childhood educational policies may be connected to greater academic outcomes for students. The findings suggest that living in a state where quality requirements of state-funded pre-k programs are high and a greater proportion of four-year-old students in the state are enrolled in state-funded pre-k are positively associated with math and verbal readiness, as students in states that have a high number of quality requirements (7+) and a greater proportion of students served by state-funded pre-k programs have higher cognitive readiness scores. But students in states where more per pupil funding is needed to reach the benchmarks of a high quality program have lower math and verbal readiness scores than their peers in states where no funding or less funding is needed. Again, these results vary between racial/ethnic groups, with some students benefiting more from these state-level policies than others.

Author

• Erin M. Baumgartner, Rice University