This study drew data from a randomized trial of a statewide prekindergarten program in Tennessee and presents new evidence on the impacts of preK on third-grade achievement using administrative data on children’s neighborhood environments. Results indicate that preK had no measurable impact on children’s third-grade math achievement regardless of children’s neighborhood conditions. However, preK significantly improved third-grade reading achievement for children living in high-poverty neighborhoods. The treatment effects on reading achievement were substantial: Among children living in high-poverty neighborhoods, those who took up an experimental assignment to attend preK scored over half a standard deviation higher on average than the control group in third grade. In contrast, preK enrollment had, if anything, a negative effect on third-grade reading achievement among children living in low-poverty neighborhoods. These differential effects were partially explained by alternative childcare options and contextual risk factors.
BaileyD.DuncanG. J.OdgersC. L.YuW. (2017). Persistence and fadeout in the impacts of child and adolescent interventions. Journal of Research on Educational Effectiveness, 10, 1934–5747. doi:10.1080/19345747.2016.1232459
2.
Berruate-ClementJ. R. (1984). Changed lives: The effects of the Perry Preschool Program on youths through age 19 [Monographs of the High/Scope Educational Research Foundation, Number Eight]. Retrieved from http://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/ED313128.pdf
Brooks-GunnJ.JohnsonA. D.LeventhalT. (2010). Disorder, turbulence, and resources in children’s homes and neighborhoods. In Chaos and its influence on children’s development: An ecological perspective (pp. 155–170). Washington, DC: American Psychological Association. doi:10.1037/12057-000
ChettyR.FriedmanJ. N.HendrenN.JonesM. R.PorterS. R. (2018, October). The Opportunity Atlas: Mapping the childhood roots of social mobility (NBER Working Paper No. 25147). Cambridge, MA: National Bureau of Economic Research. doi:10.3386/w25147
7.
ChettyR.HendrenN.KatzL. F. (2015). The effects of exposure to better neighborhoods on children: New evidence from the Moving to Opportuity experiment. American Economic Review, 106(4), 1–88. doi:10.1257/aer.20150572
CooperB. R.LanzaS. T. (2014). Who benefits most from Head Start? Using latent class moderation to examine differential treatment effects. Child Development, 85, 2317–2338. doi:10.1111/cdev.12278
10.
DodgeK. A.GreenbergM. T.MaloneP. S. (2008). Testing an idealized dynamic cascade model of the development of serious violence in adolescence. Child Development, 79, 1907–1927. doi:10.1111/j.1467-8624.2008.01233.x
11.
FarranD. C.MeadorD.ChristopherC.NesbittK. T.BilbreyL. E. (2017). Data-driven improvement in prekindergarten classrooms: Report from a partnership in an urban district. Child Development, 88, 1466–1479. doi:10.1111/cdev.12906
12.
FitzpatrickM. D. (2008). Starting school at four: The effect of universal pre-kindergarten on children’s academic achievement. B. E. Journal of Economic Analysis & Policy, 8(1), 1–38. doi:10.2202/1935-1682.1897
GalsterG. (2012). The mechanism(s) of neighbourhood effects: Theory, evidence, and policy implication. In van HamM.ManleyD.BaileyN.SimpsonL.MaclennanD. (Eds.), Neighbourhood effects research: New perspectives (pp. 23–56). New York, NY: Springer.
15.
GormleyW. T.PhillipsD.GayerT. (2008). Preschool programs can boost school readiness. Science, 320, 1723–1724. doi:10.1126/science.1156019
16.
GreenT. (2015). Places of inequality, places of possibility: Mapping “opportunity in geography” across urban school-communities. Urban Review, 47, 717–741. doi:10.1007/s11256-015-0331-z
HamreB. K.JusticeL. M.PiantaR. C.KildayC.SweeneyB.DownerJ. T.LeachA. (2010). Implementation fidelity of MyTeachingPartner literacy and language activities: Association with preschoolers’ language and literacy growth. Early Childhood Research Quarterly, 25, 329–347. doi:10.1016/J.ECRESQ .2009.07.002
19.
HardingD. J. (2003). Counterfactual models of neighborhood effects: The effect of neighborhood poverty on dropping out and teenage pregnancy. American Journal of Sociology, 109, 676–719. doi:10.1086/379217
20.
HardingJ. F.PaulsellD. (2018). Improving access to early care and education: An equity-focused policy research agenda. Princeton, NJ: Mathematica.
21.
HillC. J.GormleyW. T.AdelsteinS. (2015). Do the short-term effects of a high-quality preschool program persist?Early Childhood Research Quarterly, 32, 60–79. doi:10.1016/j.ecresq.2014.12.005
22.
JacobB. A.WilderT. (2010). Educational expectations and attainment (NBER Working Paper No. 15683). Cambridge, MA: National Bureau of Economic Research. Retrieved from https://www.nber.org/papers/w15683
23.
JargowskyP. (1997). Poverty and place: Ghettos, barrios, and the American city. New York, NY: Russell Sage Foundation.
24.
JocsonK. M.Thorne-WallingtonE. (2013). Mapping literacy-rich environments: Geospatial perspectives on literacy and education. Teachers College Record, 115(June), 1–24.
25.
KarchA. (2010). Policy feedback and preschool funding in the American states. Policy Studies Journal, 38, 217–234. doi:10.1111/j.1541-0072.2010.00359.x
26.
LipseyM. W.FarranD.DurkinK. (2017). Effects of the Tennessee Prekindergarten Program on children’s achievement and behavior through third grade. Early Childhood Research Quarterly, 45(4th quarter 2018), 155–176. doi:10.1016/j.ecresq.2018.03.005
McCoyD. C.ConnorsM. C.MorrisP. A.YoshikawaH.Friedman-KraussA. H. (2015). Neighborhood economic disadvantage and children’s cognitive and social-emotional development: Exploring Head Start classroom quality as a mediating mechanism. Early Childhood Research Quarterly, 32, 150–159. doi: 10.1016/j.ecresq.2015.04.003
29.
McCoyD. C.MorrisP. A.ConnorsM. C.GomezC. J.YoshikawaH. (2016). Differential effectiveness of Head Start in urban and rural communities. Journal of Applied Developmental Psychology, 43, 29–42. doi:10.1016/j.appdev.2015.12.007
30.
MillerP.Votruba-DrzalE.McQuigganM.ShawA. (2017). Pre-K classroom-economic composition and children’s early academic development. Journal of Educational Psychology, 109, 149–165. doi:10.1037/edu0000137
31.
MilnerH. R. (2015). Rac(e)ing to class: Confronting poverty and race in schools and classrooms. Cambridge, MA: Harvard Education Press.
32.
MorrisP. A.ConnorsM.Friedman-KraussA.McCoyD.WeilandC.FellerA.PageL. (2017). New findings on impact variation from the Head Start Impact Study: Informing the scale-up of early childhood programs. AERA Open, 4(2), 1–16. doi:10.1177/2332858418769287
33.
PumaM.BellS.CookR.HeidC. (2010). Head Start impact study: Final report. Washington, DC: U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. Retrieved from http://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/ED507845.pdf
34.
PumaM.BellS.CookR.HeidC.BroeneP.JenkinsF.. . . DownerJ. (2012). Third grade follow-up to the Head Start Impact Study: Final report. Washington, DC: U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. Retrieved from http://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/ED539264.pdf
35.
ReardonS. F.BischoffK. (2011). Income inequality and income segregation. American Journal of Sociology, 116, 1092–1153. doi:10.1086/657114
36.
RosenbaumP. R.RubinD. B. (1983). The central role of the propensity score in observational studies for causal effects. Biometrika, 70, 41–55.
37.
RubinD. B. (1987). Multiple imputation for nonresponse in surveys. New York, NY: Wiley.
38.
SchochetP. Z.DekeJ. (2014). Understanding variation in treatment effects in education impact evaluations: An overview of quantitative methods. Washington, DC: U.S. Department of Education. Retrieved from https://ies.ed.gov/ncee/pubs/20144017/pdf/20144017.pdf
39.
SharkeyP.FaberJ. W. (2014). Where, when, why, and for whom do residential contexts matter? Moving away from the dichotomous understanding of neighborhood effects. Annual Review of Sociology, 40, 559–579. doi:10.1146/annurev soc-071913-043350
40.
SharkeyP.Tirado-StrayerN.PapachristosA. V.RaverC. C. (2012). The effect of local violence on children’s attention and impulse control. American Journal of Public Health, 102, 2287–2293. doi:10.2105/ajph.2012.300789
41.
SmallM. L. (2008). Four reasons to abandon the idea of the ghetto. City and Community, 7, 389–398. doi:10.1111/j.1540-6040.2008.00271_8.x
42.
SwensonK. (2008). Child care arrangements in urban and rural areas. Washington, DC: Office of the Assistant Secretary for Planning and Evaluation.
43.
TateW. F. (2008). “Geography of opportunity”: Poverty, place, and educational outcomes. Educational Researcher, 37, 397–411. doi:10.3102/0013189X08326409
ValentinoR. (2018). Will public pre-K really close achievement gaps? Gaps in prekindergarten quality between students and across states. American Educational Research Journal, 55, 79–116. doi:10.3102/0002831217732000
46.
van EwijkR.SleegersP. J. C. (2010). The effect of peer socioeconomic status on student achievement: A meta-analysis. Educational Research Review, 5, 134–150.
47.
VanderWeeleT. J.KnolM. J. (2011). Interpretation of subgroup analyses in randomized trials: heterogeneity versus secondary interventions. Annals of Internal Medicine, 154, 680–683. doi:10.7326/0003-4819-154-10-201105170-00008
48.
Votruba-DrzalE.MillerP.ColeyR. L. (2016). Poverty, urbanicity, and children’s development of early academic skills. Child Development Perspectives, 10, 3–9. doi:10.1111/cdep.12152
49.
WilsonW. J. (2012). The truly disadvantaged: The inner city, the underclass, and public policy. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.
50.
WodtkeG. T. (2013). Duration and timing of exposure to neighborhood poverty and the risk of adolescent parenthood. Demography, 50, 1765–1788. doi:10.1007/s13524-013-0219-z
51.
WodtkeG. T.ElwertF.HardingD. J. (2016). Neighborhood effect heterogeneity by family income and developmental period. American Journal of Sociology, 121, 1168–1222. doi:10.1086/684137
52.
WodtkeG. T.HardingD. J. (2012). Poor families, poor neighborhoods: How family poverty intensifies the impact of concentrated disadvantage (Population Studies Center Research Report No. 12-776). Retrieved from https://www.psc.isr.umich.edu/pubs/abs/7739
53.
WodtkeG. T.HardingD. J.ElwertF. (2011). Neighborhood effects in temporal perspective: The impact of long-term exposure to concentrated disadvantage on high school graduation. American Sociological Review, 76, 713–736. doi:10.1177/0003122411420816
54.
YoshikawaH.WeilandC.Brooks-GunnJ.BurchinalM.GormleyW.LudwigJ.ZaslowM. J. (2013). Investing in our future: The evidence base on preschool education. New York, NY: Foundation for Child Development.
Supplementary Material
Please find the following supplemental material available below.
For Open Access articles published under a Creative Commons License, all supplemental material carries the same license as the article it is associated with.
For non-Open Access articles published, all supplemental material carries a non-exclusive license, and permission requests for re-use of supplemental material or any part of supplemental material shall be sent directly to the copyright owner as specified in the copyright notice associated with the article.
