In 2010, states spent an average of $700 less per child on preschool than in the previous year—an ominous sign to advocates of state-funded pre-k. Early Ed Watchreported on the funding drop—and some other noteworthy trends—last week when the National Institute for Early Education Research released its annual report, The State of Preschool 2010. The report tracks state-by-state trends in preschool spending, enrollment and quality.
For this week’s podcast, we took a deeper look at these trends with Rutgers University Professor Steve Barnett, who is co-director of NIEER and an author of the report. On this podcast, Barnett digs in to which states were winners and losers in this year’s yearbook, and how both the state and federal governments should be viewing state-funded pre-k programs as they grapple with constrained budgets.
Early Ed Watch podcast – May 3, 2011
Podcast: What the Funding Drop Means for State-Funded Preschool
With our guest, Steve Barnett, co-director of the National Institute for Early Education Research and Professor at Rutgers University.
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The Early Education Initiative seeks to promote a high-quality and continuous system of early care and education for all children, birth to age 8. While much of our focus is on pre-K up through 3rd grade, we also examine the need for high-quality infant and toddler care and better policies to support new parents.
Our forum on LinkedIn is a space for school district leaders, early childhood educators, policymakers and other interested parties to discuss their struggles, questions and achievements in creating a “before birth and up through third grade” system. It grew out of an event held at the New America Foundation on March 2, 2011.
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