While we know that evidence generally points to the fact that high-quality early years provision benefits the development of disadvantaged children, when the amount of such provision into school years is increased, it is less impressive, according to Art Reynolds from the Institute of Child Development at the University of Minnesota.

The school age part of Chicago Child-Parent Centers (CPC), one of the USA’s oldest federally funded programs, seems to be boosting graduation rates by about nine points, but the impact on grade completion is marginal. Reynolds, who has been studying the effects of the CPCs the since their implementation in 1968, concludes that there may be a threshold beyond which effects of high quality early years provision begin to diminish.

CPCs have both pre-school and school-age components – typically a child in early years receives 500 hours a year - and Reynolds has looked at the effects different amounts of the program has on children, following them until their 28th birthday.

To explain his findings Reynolds turns to what might be called the Heckman hypothesis, named after the Nobel Laureate who advocates for much greater investment in the first three years of life when non-cognitive skills are being formed.

In the intervention group he looked at, Reynolds has 989 children who got either full or half day CPC pre-school and kindergarten. Just over two-thirds of these children also received support into the school age years, and for over half of the sample the extra help lasted for between four and six years.

But Reynolds also has 500 low-income children who did not attend pre-school CPC. They are a strong test for CPC, however, because all went to full-day kindergarten, 15 per cent attended Headstart and 30 per cent received some of the CPC school age support.

Pre-school support alone leads to better school attainment, staying on to higher grade, and an increased admission to four years at college. Even this low dose boosts the participants’ adult annual income by about $800 a year.

Society benefits most as early years provision leads to lower rates of crime and justice involvement and fewer people being locked up.

Reynolds points out that the CPC model works through the accumulation of cognitive skills, better social adjustment, greater motivation to learn, more family and school support, which are cemented by a whole set of behaviors from school entry to early adulthood that underpin better outcomes.

These factors, sitting between the CPC and the benefits for children, explain three-fifths of the effects for children getting just the amount of pre-school provision and two-fifths of the effects for those getting the extended intervention.

One conclusion is that the real benefits of early years provision can be secured prior to the school years.

Reference
Arthur J. Reynolds, Judy A. Temple, Suh-Ruu Ou, Irma A. Arteaga, Barry A. B. White, (2011) "School-Based Early Childhood Education and Age-28 Well-Being: Effects by Timing, Dosage, and Subgroups", ScienceVol. 333 no. 6040 pp. 360-364

Links:
http://www.cehd.umn.edu/icd/faculty/Reynolds.html
http://www.cehd.umn.edu/icd/CLS/