- Full-day preschool better than part-day, study shows, By Lauren Fitzpatrick, November 28, 2014, Chicago Sun-Times: “Children who went to full-day preschool at one of Chicago’s Midwest Child Parent Centers had higher attendance, lower chronic truancy and were generally better prepared for kindergarten than children who attended only part of the day. That’s according to a new report published this week in the Journal of the American Medical Association from the Human Capital Research Collaborative which studied about 1,000 children enrolled during the 2012-13 school year, the first year the Collaborative helped organize full-day programs in Chicago…”
- Full-day preschool prepares kids better for kindergarten, Minnesota study concludes, Associated Press, November 26, 2014, The Oregonian: “A new study at the University of Minnesota found that child participants who attended all-day preschool were better prepared for kindergarten than those who didn’t. Early childhood education advocates say the results show Minnesota should invest more in preschool programs. They say the move could help narrow the achievement gap between white and minority students in Minnesota…”
Tag: Early childhood education
Child Care Subsidies
Child care subsidies for low-income parents approved after years of cuts, By Diana Dillaber Murray, November 19, 2014, Oakland Daily Tribune: “For the first time in 18 years, Congress has approved funding to help ensure parents of some of the 11 million of the youngest children in low-income working families can afford child care. Congress reauthorized the Child Care and Development Block Grant Act 2014 Tuesday in a bipartisan vote. About 6 million children of the 11 million children in child care are babies and toddlers…”
Child Poverty and Health
More than half of Cleveland kids live in poverty, and it’s making them sick, By Brie Zeltner, September 30, 2014, Cleveland Plain Dealer: “Census data released last week revealed a sobering truth about the conditions that face children growing up in Cleveland: more than half of the city’s kids—54 percent– live in poverty, the second highest rate of any big city nationally. As bad as that sounds, what’s worse is what it means: not only does poverty make it more difficult to secure stable, safe housing, nutritious food and quality, affordable daycare so that parents can work, but the daily stress kids endure under these conditions takes a huge toll on their mental and physical health, experts say. The kids pay this toll—in the form of asthma, diabetes, behavioral problems, truancy and failure in school. We pay it too, in higher healthcare costs as they become sicker adults, in the cost of incarceration for juvenile and then adult offenders, and in the lost productivity that results when such a large number of children cannot achieve. Some studies estimate that cost at roughly half a trillion dollars, or 3.8 percent of our nation’s gross domestic product (GDP), a year…”