Poster #1 - An Empirical Study of Value-Based Cost-Benefit Analysis of Early Childhood Support Programs

• In Event: 63.088 - MTCC Poster Session 14
  In Poster Session: 63.088-1 - Human Development 2

Abstract

Ages 0-5 are critical for brain development. To close the gaps between advantaged and disadvantaged children, accountability measures have been demanded from pre-K education programs to show more return of public investment in local service providers. This trend study examines the benefits of over $10 million annual state funding from the California Children and Families Act (Proposition 10) in early childhood development. Cost and benefit data are tracked across 39 programs in Kern County, California during 2010-2017, and a literature-based Process-Person-Context-Time (PPCT) model is employed to guide the data analyses. Based on the confidence intervals estimated by rigorous methods of bootstrapping, this study finds that program benefits exceed the state investment from both use-value and exchange-value perspectives.

Authors

• Jinping Sun, California State University - Bakersfield

• Jianjun Wang, California State University - Bakersfield

• Kathleen Joyce Hylton, First 5 Kern