2-184 - Accountability Comes to Early Childhood: New Research on Quality Rating & Improvement Systems

Session Type: Paper Symposium

Integrative Statement

Now in 37 states, Quality Rating and Improvement Systems (QRIS) are a popular policy lever for improving the quality of early childhood (ECE) programs through accountability. Unfortunately, the rapid roll-out of QRIS has outpaced the research base around measuring and improving quality in ECE settings. In particular, we do not know whether the assumptions underlying these systems hold, whether QRIS effectively capture “true quality,” and whether QRIS lead to systematic-wide quality improvements. This panel includes four papers which provide rigorous new evidence about accountability efforts in ECE and provide insights for QRIS design.

The first three papers address critical assumptions embedded in the QRIS logic models: that parents struggle to assess the quality of ECE options and that QRIS ratings accurately reflect the features of quality that build school-readiness. Paper 1 describes the extent to which parents’ assessment of ECE quality align with observed program quality, practical features and children’s learning gains. Paper 2 uses data from six large studies to simulate QRIS scores and investigate the association between quality ratings and children’s school-readiness. Relatedly, Paper 3 compares classroom observation data collected by local raters as part of a QRIS to researcher-collected ratings, and assesses whether observations collected affordably and at scale are associated with children’s learning gains. The final paper provides causal evidence on the impact of QRIS star ratings on program quality and enrollment.

Together these papers provide essential new evidence regarding both the logic behind and implementation of accountability systems in ECE settings.

Sub Unit

• Social Policy

Chair

• Kimberly Boller, Mathematica Policy Research

Individual Presentations

• Do Parents Know “High Quality” Preschool When They See It? - Daphna Bassok, University of Virginia; Preston Magouirk, University of Virginia; Presenting Author: Anna Justine Markowitz, University of Virginia; Daniel Player, University of Virginia; Michelle Zagardo, University of Virginia

• Early Care and Education Center Quality and Child Outcomes: A Meta-Analysis of Six Datasets - Presenting Author: Sandra Soliday Hong, University of North Carolina; Terri Sabol, Northwestern University; Margaret Burchinal, UNC Chapel Hill

• Can Local Observers Accurately Measure Classroom Quality? Understanding Reliability and Validity of QRIS Classroom Observations - Presenting Author: Virginia Vitiello, University of Virginia; Daphna Bassok, University of Virginia; Bridget Hamre, UVA; Daniel Player, University of Virginia; Amanda P Williford, UVA

• Can Accountability Measures Increase the Quality of Early Childhood Education? Evidence from North Carolina - Daphna Bassok, University of Virginia; Thomas Dee, Stanford University; Presenting Author: Scott Latham, Stanford University