Debates about the potential of public pre-kindergarten (pre-k) programs to close poverty-related early education and health gaps occupy center-stage for scientists, policymakers, and education and public health officials. While there is substantial evidence to support the power of pre-k to promote positive development in the short-term, the mechanisms that explain those positive short-term effects are poorly understood. Moreover, there is no evidence examining pathways for sustaining positive short-term effects into early primary schooling (1st ? 4th grade) to guide actionable decisions to improve education and health for vulnerable young children. We focus on children?s self-regulatory skills (e.g., attention and impulse control; management of emotions; memory, planning, and organization) and the public pre-k classroom features that support their development as prime candidates for mechanisms linking pre-k with education and health outcomes for three reasons: (1) the brain regions underlying developing self-regulatory skills are compromised among children who have experienced significant economic adversity; (2) self-regulatory skills have been empirically documented to underlie education and health outcomes; and (3) self-regulatory skills are sensitive to intervention and thus malleable during the early childhood years. The proposed 5-year longitudinal, multi-method study will build this evidence base by first assessing a pre-k boost to low-income children?s self-regulatory, education, and health outcomes in kindergarten, and then by examining associations among this triad of outcomes, as well as testing whether self-regulatory skills explain associations between pre-k participation and education and health outcomes at kindergarten entry. We then examine mechanisms associated with pre-k classroom self- regulatory features as they explain associations between pre-k participation and kindergarten outcomes, investigating self-regulatory classroom features as mediators of kindergarten self-regulatory, education, and health outcomes. Our final goal capitalizes on the longitudinal study design to explore the processes underlying sustained pre-k impacts: we will test for the presence of and pathways to any sustained pre-k effects through 4th grade, focusing on classroom processes that may underlie fade-out of pre-k impacts. Data will be collected in the Tulsa Public Schools (TPS) district, which hosts a nationally recognized pre-k program, the impacts of which we will study beginning at kindergarten entry. In each year of the proposed project ? from K through 4th grade ? the project will include direct assessments of children?s self-regulatory, education, and health outcomes, classroom observations and teacher interviews to gather information on classroom processes and practices, and parent interviews. To analyze our data, we will employ a mix of econometric, OLS regression, and multilevel modeling approaches. Findings will illuminate the active pathways from pre-k exposure to longer-term education and health outcomes, informing the design of next-generation pre-k programs that acknowledge their role as both early learning and health-promoting interventions.
Public pre-kindergarten (pre-k) programs are promising interventions for reducing income-based disadvantages in education and health outcomes; however, the active ingredients of successful public pre-k programs that set in motion enduring education and health benefits are poorly understood. The proposed 5- year longitudinal, multi-method study will document and test understudied but promising mechanisms through which pre-k produces a strong developmental boost ? encompassing self-regulatory, education, and health outcomes ? into elementary school and the subsequent (kindergarten through 4th grade) classroom environments under which an early developmental boost is sustained, with a focus on children?s self-regulatory skills (e.g., attention and impulse control; management of emotions; memory, planning, and organization) and the classroom features that support those skills ? skills which are both notably compromised among children who have experienced significant economic adversity and empirically documented to underlie the acquisition of educational and health outcomes during the early childhood years. This new evidence will inform the design of next-generation pre-k programs that carry the promise of more effectively reducing the pervasive public health threat posed by poverty and economic insecurity to young children?s optimal development.
