Abstract:
High-quality preschool programs are widely believed to be an effective policy tool to promote the development and life-long wellbeing of children from low-income families. Yet evaluations of recent preschool programs produce puzzling findings, including negative impacts, and divergent, weaker results than were shown in demonstration programs implemented in the 1960s and 70s. In this talk, I will present our team’s review of more recent, rigorous studies that supports more cautious conclusions regarding the long-term effectiveness of today’s preschool programs. I will then provide potential explanations for why modern evaluations of preschool programs have produced less positive and more mixed results, focusing on changes in a broad range of counterfactual conditions and preschool instructional practices. I will also address popular explanations such as subsequent low-quality schooling experiences that, we argue, do not appear to account for weakening program effectiveness. The field must take seriously the smaller positive, null, and negative impacts from modern programs and strive to understand why effects vary and how to boost program effectiveness through rigorous, longitudinal research.

Biography:
Jade Marcus Jenkins is an Associate Professor at the University of California Irvine School of Education studying early childhood policy. Her work is multidisciplinary, focusing on issues that are amenable to educational and social policy intervention, using diverse research methods to evaluate programs and understand the mechanisms that promote child and family wellbeing. She received her B.S. and M.S. degrees from the University of Florida in Family, Youth and Community Sciences, and Ph.D. in Public Policy from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. After the M.S. program, Jade worked at a quasi-governmental nonprofit in Florida’s early childhood care and education system. This firsthand experience in policy implementation was her primary motivation to pursue a Ph.D. in public policy and specialize in early childhood development to learn how to evaluate and develop policies that provide support for families with young children and reduce poverty in the long-term.