The Pew Charitable Trusts - State and Consumer Initiatives about Pre-K Now

Proof Into Policy: Pre-K Milestones

View our infographic on nationwide pre-k funding in the last decade.

Marci Young: The Future of Pre-K Education

Pre-K Now Director Marci Young discusses the state of pre-k education and how the Pre-K Now campaign’s momentum would be carried forward.

Pre-K Now: Marking a Decade of Pre-K Milestones

A decade of pre-k policy wins has made a pre-K-12 education system within our nation's reach.

Pew Convenes Education Leaders to Chart Course for Pre-K-12 Future

The Pew Center on the States’ Pre-K Now campaign today brought together education leaders, advocates, business leaders, and national and state policy makers to celebrate significant accomplishments in the pre-k movement and highlight Pre-K Now’s capstone report, Transforming Public Education: Pathway to a Pre-K-12 Future.

Using Pre-K to Advance Education Reform

By strengthening linkages between pre-k programs and education reform agendas, Early Childhood Councils are well positioned to influence their states’ school improvement activities. This brief identifies specific steps councils can take to maximize their states’ investments in early education including aligning policy prior to and following Pre-K.

Transforming Public Education

In its final report, Pre-K Now laid out a strategy to transform public education by moving from the current K-12 model to a more effective, evidence-based pre-K-12 system.

Pre-K as School Turnaround Strategy

This issue brief highlights how investing limited funds in proven early education programs can raise student achievement and improve school performance.

On the Home Front

This issue brief from Pre-K Now details the results of an Internet survey of 500 military households exploring the challenges facing military families with young children.

Creative State Pre-K Policies Offer Smart Federal Opportunities

This brief highlights some of the most promising state efforts to fund high-quality Pre-K programs and offers recommendations to help federal policy makers support and encourage greater expansion.

Lessons in Early Learning

This 2010 report looked at how Montgomery County Public Schools used local and federal dollars to craft, implement and improve a system-wide education reform strategy built on a foundation of providing high-quality pre-k education.

Engaged Families, Effective Pre-K

This 2010 report identified policies that can enhance family engagement in state pre-kindergarten and highlighted examples from states that are leading the way.

The Right Policy at the Right Time

This 2010 report answered two questions: How did the campaign build a successful national movement to advance pre-k? And: How can we use the lessons learned to inform public debates on other policies essential to help children thrive?

Formula for Success

This report discussed the benefits and challenges integrating early education into states’ general education funding structures and explored the different models for employing such a strategy.

The Case for Pre-K in Education Reform

This brief from Pre-K Now highlighted findings from evaluations of state-funded pre-k programs that continue to document gains in key measures of student learning, including early literacy, math and vocabulary; reduced need for special and remedial education; and significantly lower incidences of grade retention.

Pre-K & the Race to the Top

This report informed education advocates and stakeholders about the innovative strategies that states used to include pre-k in their Phase 1 proposals for Race to the Top.

A Matter of Degrees

This 2010 report, authored by Marisa Bueno, Linda Darling-Hammond and Danielle Gonzales, reviewed research on training for pre-k teachers and concluded that educators with at least a bachelor’s degree coupled with specialized training in early childhood are best able to foster development of the cognitive, social and emotional skills children need to be ready for kindergarten.

Tapping Title I

A companion to Pew's earlier white paper, New Beginnings: Using Federal Title I Funds to Support Local Pre-K Efforts, this 2010 brief provided basic information that superintendents, school board members and other district officials need to make informed choices about using Title I resources to support quality pre-k programs.

New Beginnings

This 2009 policy paper outlined the increased federal investments in Title I and highlighted districts that have used this funding stream successfully to establish and strengthen their early education programs.

Beyond the School Yard

When state and federal funding for pre-k falls short, school administrators can collaborate with community-based programs to expand higher-quality early learning opportunities. This 2009 report highlighted the benefits and challenges of these collaborations.

The Pre-K Pinch

This report reveals that eligibility requirements and prohibitively high costs lead such families to sacrifice basic household needs to pay for early education and care for their children, or to settle for low-quality options with unproven benefits.

Meeting the Challenge of Rural Pre-K

This brief laid out the need for greater accessibility to high-quality pre-k in rural communities and proposes a range of policy options that the federal government can consider to address challenges like transportation and facilities and promote collaborations with Head Start.

Meaningful Investments in Pre-K

This 2008 brief, written jointly with the Institute for Women’s Policy Research, examined the costs associated with quality in pre-kindergarten programs.

Funding the Future

This 2008 report highlighted strategies and sources that states and some cities are tapping in order to expand and supplement current pre-k funding during tough fiscal times.

Common Vision, Different Paths

This 2007 report, written jointly with ZERO TO THREE, provided real-life examples of challenges encountered by five states currently working to build high-quality, comprehensive early childhood systems and the strategies they used to overcome them.

Pre-K for Military Families

This 2007 report recommended that state policymakers should help the children of our nation's military personnel meet the unique challenges of the military lifestyle by providing them with high-quality pre-k.

Dollars and Sense

This 2007 review of 10 studies on the economic impact of pre-k demonstrated why a growing number of business leaders and economists are increasingly convinced that high-quality pre-k is a sound investment.

Better Outcomes for All

How can Head Start and state pre-kindergarten programs work together to better serve young children and their families? This 2007 report examined the answers, drawing on research and in-depth interviews with state pre-k program directors, Head Start collaboration coordinators, and providers of both Head Start and state pre-k programs.

An Economic Analysis of Pre-K in Arkansas

This 2006 report found that each dollar invested to date in the high-quality Arkansas Better Chance Pre-K program will yield $2.32 in future savings to the state and that offering pre-k to all children would return savings of more than $100 million.

Pre-K and Latinos

This 2006 report showed that, by providing Latino children with culturally and linguistically appropriate services in high-quality, pre-k-for-all programs, educators and policymakers can help close the achievement gap and make a major contribution to realizing this growing population's remarkable potential.

A Diverse System Delivers for Pre-K

To provide pre-k services to more children, states are increasingly turning to "diverse or mixed" delivery, which uses both community-based and school sites. This July 2006 report examined New York's successful model.

Funding the Future 2006

This 2006 report examined how policymakers nationwide have found innovative approaches to financing pre-kindergarten.

An Economic Analysis of Four-Year-Old Kindergarten in Wisconsin

This 2005 report looked at how every state dollar invested in pre-k would return 68 cents in savings to Wisconsin's education system.

An Economic Analysis of Pre-K in Louisiana

This 2005 report looked at the important role pre-k can play in the economic recovery of Louisiana, where every $1 invested in pre-k would produce $2.25 in benefits for the state.