Equity in Access: Availability of Quality Early Care and Education in Disadvantaged and Advantaged Communities

• In Event: 1-107 - New Insights on Quality and Access in Early Care and Education: Lessons from QRIS Data

Integrative Statement

Quality Rating and Improvement Systems (QRIS) have been implemented by many states to define early care and education (ECE) quality standards, to establish a system that encourages adoption of those standards, and to provide adequate supports for quality improvement (Boller et al., 2014; Zellman & Perlman, 2008). Children in higher levels of QRIS programs have demonstrate better developmental outcomes (Jeon & Buettner, 2015; Thornburg et al., 2011). No studies, to our knowledge, however, investigated whether QRIS promotes the availability of high quality programs in socioeconomically disadvantaged communities. This study examines whether higher levels of QRIS programs became more available for families in disadvantaged and/or advantaged neighborhood areas over the last four years of QRIS implementation in Maryland.

This study includes Maryland’s QRIS administrative program-level data that were collected in 2015 (n = 1649), 2016 (n = 3675), 2017 (n = 3920), and 2018 (n = 4113). The administrative data include program zip codes, types (e.g., center-based, family child care, etc.), and QRIS published rating levels (five levels available – higher level represents better quality within the block system). The program-level zip codes were linked with the 2011–2016 American Community Survey to understand neighborhood characteristics of the program locations. Neighborhood concentrated disadvantage was measured using four characteristics of zip codes: the percentage of families below the poverty line, unemployment ratio, and the percentages of female-headed households with children and families receiving public assistance (Cronbach’s alpha = .91; Sampson et al., 2002). Neighborhood advantage was calculated using the percentages of adults with at least a bachelor’s degree, households with incomes greater than $100,000, and adults in managerial/professional jobs (Cronbach’s alpha = .93; Dupere et al., 2010). Using the means as cut-offs, we categorized the neighborhood characteristics into high/low disadvantage areas and high/low advantage areas. We then examined the distribution of QRIS levels across different neighborhood areas over time (Table 1). We also compared the distributions of center-based and family child care programs. The chi-square test statistics were used to investigate whether there were significant changes in the number of programs across neighborhood characteristics, QRIS levels, and program types over time.

Higher percentages of level 4 and 5 programs were located in high disadvantage areas in 2018 compared to the 2015 to 2017 data (Figure 1) although the distributions were not statistically different (χ2 = 3.8, p = .28 for level 4 and χ2 = 4.2, p = .24 for level 5). Furthermore, increased number of level 3 family child care providers were in disadvantaged areas (χ2 = 8.38, p < .05). The percentages of level 2 and 3 programs in advantaged areas increased since 2015. The availability of level 1 family child care providers particularly increased in advantaged areas (χ2 = 18.51, p < .001). Although most of changes were not statistically significant, it is meaningful to note that we begin to see the changes in the number of high quality programs available in highly disadvantaged areas.

This study suggests that QRIS has a potential to promote the availability of high quality ECE in disadvantaged areas.

Authors

• Lieny Jeon, Johns Hopkins University
  Presenting Author

• Tonya Satchell, Johns Hopkins University
  Non-Presenting Author

• Jennifer Dale, Johns Hopkins University
  Non-Presenting Author

• R Christopher Swanson, Johns Hopkins University
  Non-Presenting Author