RD242 - The Commonwealth of Virginia’s Preschool Pilot Initiative: A Final Report Prepared on Behalf of the Virginia Department of Education


Executive Summary:
The Virginia Preschool Pilot Initiative was designed as a one-year experiment to examine the feasibility of offering state-funded prekindergarten to more children at risk for school failure through diverse delivery systems. Central features of the initiative include:

• preschool administration by or through local school readiness collaboratives rather than solely by a school district;
• braiding funding streams to reach more children or provide more wrap-around and support services; and
• partnering with community-based, private preschools.

Approximately 280 children participated in some portion of the pilot program this year. The pilot preschools were located in 44 different classrooms (five in public schools) and in ten family childcare homes. Ten localities across Virginia participated in the pilot initiative.

A central mission of the Virginia Preschool Initiative (VPI), the state’s preschool program for at-risk four-year-olds, is to reduce achievement gaps between disadvantaged children and their more advantaged peers upon entering kindergarten. Since its inception in 1994, VPI has mostly been offered by and taught in public schools, in classes of children funded exclusively by VPI. However, some localities have offered VPI in mixed publicly funded classrooms (combining children funded through VPI, Head Start and local funds, for example) or through contracting out VPI to community organizations. As part of the pilot initiative, the 2007 General Assembly designated twelve localities eligible to participate based on their history of providing these alternative delivery systems. At the same time, they were encouraged to try innovative strategies to increase and strengthen their preschool networks and more efficiently provide a continuum of services related to school readiness. Thus, each of the ten localities that elected to participate targeted different strategies based on local needs, resulting in a variety of “pilots.” Study limitations include a nonsystematic, small sample with localities piloting multiple strategies with different aims, making the findings suggestive rather than definitive.

Findings overall indicate that diverse preschool delivery as conducted this year is feasible and is associated with documented benefits to children and to programs. Specifically:

Pilot localities increased access to prekindergarten services for at-risk children.

• Through the pilot program, participating localities provided VPI services to approximately ten percent more at-risk children than they had previously. Across the state, 280 (2 percent) more at-risk children attended preschool this year than would have under regular VPI funding. Two hundred thirty-eight children attended the same program for the entire school year. More critically, children who had previously not been able to attend center-based preschool, due to funding stream constraints, parent work hours, or other factors, were able to do so through braiding funding and the increased use of private providers. It appears that in some cases, children received higher quality care than they might otherwise have had in the same placements, due to technical and material support offered to providers through the pilot program

Pilot programs delivered reasonably high-quality programs, with considerable variation observed.

• Programs met between 7 and 10 of 10 NIEER program standards, with teacher qualifications the most variable. All public school and 70 percent of private school teachers had a bachelor’s or advanced degree, and 76 percent of teachers had pre-K specialization. Forty-five percent of assistant teachers had a Child Development Associate credential or equivalent. Five percent of lead teachers obtained prekindergarten specialization this year. Having a college degree was not related to observed quality in classrooms.

• Two standardized observational instruments found somewhat different patterns of quality. Teachers offered high-quality emotional support and classroom organization, with lower instructional support, with no statistical differences found between public and private pilot schools. The pilot group overall was comparable on these three quality dimensions to a sample of statewide VPI programs, with pilot programs exhibiting higher emotional support than the statewide VPI program sample. Global quality of preschool environments, a measure that assesses program space and provisions, daily structure, and teacher-child interactions, ranged from mid-low to high. Thirty-seven percent of observed programs fell within or close to the good quality range and programs averaged 4.3 on the seven point scale. No programs fell into the inadequate range. Virtually all programs had difficulties with personal care routines. Private schools offered more child choice time on average than did public schools. NAEYC-accreditation was associated with higher global environmental quality.

• Observational measures did not distinguish program type (public vs. private) on average, but a wider range of quality - both higher and lower - was observed in the private schools overall.

• While overall program quality was generally mid-range to high, considerable variability existed, supporting the use of a standard quality rating and improvement tool.

• Teacher morale appeared to be high, with relatively low teacher turnover and high teacher job satisfaction. Lead teacher turnover was similar in public and private schools.

• Forty percent of lead and 55 percent of assistant teachers reported actively working on attaining professional or higher education degrees.

• Lead teacher prekindergarten specialization was associated with more classroom time spent on child-directed activities, a practice recommended by early childhood educators and researchers.

Pilot students appeared to benefit from pilot prekindergarten education.

• Students attending pilot classrooms significantly increased their overall preliteracy and early numeracy counting skills from fall to spring. This gain was over and above gains that could be expected based on more time to be exposed to these concepts outside of preschool, which suggests a specific preschool effect. While more advantaged classmates had higher overall preacademic skills, pilot students achieved higher preliteracy gains across the year, narrowing the school-entry achievement gap.

• Pilot students made significant preliteracy gains, but gains were less than those made by children attending other VPI programs across the state. Within the pilot program, those operated by and located in public schools, and classroom-based private schools more familiar with VPI delivery, tended to have higher preliteracy gains.

• By spring, 94 percent of pilot students could count out loud to ten or more, and 47.1 percent to 20 or more. Ninety-six percent of pilot students counted beyond five in one-to-one correspondence, exceeding state standards.

• Most (90 percent) pilot students appeared to have social skills in the average range, with no significant differences found between pilot students and classmates or by classroom factors on average. Publicly funded students, including pilot, appeared to be overrepresented in a small subgroup of students with poor social skills.

• Teachers and parents reported that students were enthusiastic about learning and attending their pilot programs. Students’ engagement with learning increased across the year, particularly for girls, older children and those without disabilities.

• Pilot students were generally healthy, though they were more likely to have experienced a serious illness in their lifetime and suffered from ill health in the recent past, compared to more advantaged peers.

• Blended classrooms performed similarly to classrooms with all pilot VPI students on preacademic and social skill measures.

Local school readiness groups valued collaborating and often played a vital role in providing quality improvement and resources to programs.

• Local collaborative leaders cited many benefits to coordinating a diverse preschool delivery system, despite its taking time, effort, and resources. These included resource sharing, networking, and providing a means by which to improve preschool quality in their community.

• Some pilot collaboratives appeared to play an instrumental role in crisis and case management. Collaboratives appeared to help providers improve their quality services by offering teacher training, mentoring, more or improved family support services, and/or health and developmental screenings. Approximately 80 percent of pilot program directors stated they planned to implement changes in response to the pilot, with most focused on aligning their programs more closely with state pre-K education, changing curriculum or assessment procedures, and improving program quality.

The pilot demonstrated that diverse preschool delivery is feasible and appears associated with benefits for children at-risk for school difficulties, narrowing the preliteracy achievement gap with more advantaged children. State guidelines and funding for staff positions and technical support appears to be necessary to help localities blend funding, oversee programs, improve and maintain quality, and accurately collect records. These factors will be important to successfully develop a mixed delivery model of high-quality prekindergarten for at-risk children in Virginia.