Enrolling in publicly funded early childhood education involves searching for programs, applying, verifying eligibility, and registering with the program. Many families do not complete this process, despite demonstrated interest. In this study, we assessed support for families as they verify eligibility as a means for increasing enrollment completion rates. Working with district administrators, we randomly assigned families to receive either (a) the district’s usual, modest communications; (b) the usual communications plus weekly text message reminders with a formal tone; or (c) the usual communications plus weekly personalized, friendly text message reminders. Text message reminders increased verification rates by seven percentage points (regardless of tone), and personalized messages increased enrollment rates for some groups. Exchanges between parents and administrators revealed the obstacles parents confronted.

中文翻译：

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帮助父母应对幼儿教育的入学过程：来自新奥尔良的实验证据

参加政府资助的早期儿童教育需要搜索程序，申请，验证资格以及在程序中注册。尽管表现出兴趣，许多家庭仍未完成此过程。在这项研究中，我们评估了对家庭的支持，因为他们验证了资格，以此来提高入学率。我们与地区行政人员合作，随机分配了家庭，以接收（a）地区通常的，适度的通信；（b）通常的通讯加上每周的正式短信提醒；或（c）日常通讯以及每周个性化，友好的短信提醒。短信提醒使验证率提高了7个百分点（与音调无关），个性化消息使某些组的注册率提高了。