Category Archives: Early childhood program design issues

We have enough evidence to expand quality pre-K

Posted on February 25, 2016 by timbartik

Professor Dale Farran of Vanderbilt University has a new policy brief at the Brookings Institution website, entitled “We need more evidence in order to create effective pre-K programs”. This policy brief makes the skeptical researchers’ case for collecting more research … Continue reading →

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Reflections coming out of the recent AEI forum debating pre-K

Posted on February 18, 2016 by timbartik

On Wednesday, February 17, I participated in a forum at the American Enterprise Institute. The forum, organized by AEI Research Fellow Katharine Stevens, was entitled “Does pre-K work? A look at the research.” Forum participants, in addition to me, were … Continue reading →

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Thinking again about earlier-age versus later-age interventions in skills development

Posted on June 30, 2015 by timbartik

The recent paper on the Kalamazoo Promise, by me and my colleagues Brad Hershbein and Marta Lachowska, found that this program, which provides up to 100% free college tuition for graduates of Kalamazoo Public Schools, increases college completion sufficiently to … Continue reading →

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Increasing educational performance and reducing educational disparities is more feasible if pursued through high-productivity interventions, including but not limited to early childhood education

Posted on May 28, 2015 by timbartik

On May 27, 2015, the Upjohn Institute released a report on Michigan’s school finance system and how to reform it to improve student performance in Michigan, and lessen disparities among children in various income groups.  The lead author of the … Continue reading →

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The adequacy of state pre-K funding for quality and access

Posted on May 12, 2015 by timbartik

The latest edition of “The State of Preschool-2014” was released on May 10, 2015 by the National Institute for Early Education Research. This annual release of data and analysis has become essential to understanding what is going on with publicly-funded … Continue reading →

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Forum discusses universal versus targeted preschool, age 4 versus earlier age programs, and public school versus private provision of preschool

Posted on May 6, 2015 by timbartik

On May 5, I spoke at in a forum in Minnesota on issues in designing preschool programs. The forum had six speakers with diverse perspectives on how to design early childhood programs. The context for the discussion was a debate … Continue reading →

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Why preschool should be universal

Posted on May 6, 2015 by timbartik

On Tuesday, May 5, I was asked to speak at a forum in Minnesota, on why I think that preschool should be universal rather than income-targeted. Below are my prepared remarks: My main reason for arguing that publicly supported preschool … Continue reading →

Posted in Distribution of benefits, Early childhood program design issues | 1 Comment

The importance of neighborhoods for child development

Posted on May 5, 2015 by timbartik

On Monday, May 4, the New York Times gave prominent coverage to two recent papers that provide strong evidence that better neighborhoods or local areas for young children make a large difference in increasing future adult earnings and income for … Continue reading →

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Economic diversity in pre-K, peer effects, and universal versus targeted programs

Posted on May 1, 2015 by timbartik

A recent report by Jeanne Reid and Sharon Lynn Kagan of Columbia University, written for The Century Foundation, argues for greater consideration of economic diversity as a feature that helps determine quality in pre-K programs. The report documents that low-income … Continue reading →

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Head Start impacts: the importance of the counterfactual

Posted on April 14, 2015 by timbartik

Two recent research papers, by Kline and Walters, and by Feller et al., suggest that Head Start has much larger impacts when it is compared to the alternative of “no preschool”. This finding tends to increase the likelihood that Head … Continue reading →

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