Abstract

The sustaining environments thesis hypothesizes that PreK effects are more likely to persist into later grades if children experience high-quality learning environments in the years subsequent to PreK. This study tests this hypothesis using data from a statewide PreK randomized experiment in Tennessee that found positive effects at the end of PreK that did not persist past kindergarten. These data were combined with teacher observation and school-level value-added scores from Tennessee’s formal evaluation system to determine whether positive effects of PreK persisted for the subgroup of students exposed to higher-quality learning environments between kindergarten and 3rd grade. Neither exposure to highly effective teachers nor attending a high-quality school was sufficient by itself to explain differences in achievement between PreK participants and non-participants in 3rd-grade. However, this study found evidence that having both was associated with a sustained advantage for PreK participants in both math and ELA. Notably, however, very few children were exposed to high-quality learning environments after PreK, suggesting that maximizing PreK investments may require attending to the quality of learning environments during PreK and beyond.

摘要

维持环境的理论假设，如果孩子在PreK以后的几年中体验高质量的学习环境，则PreK的效果更有可能持续到更高的年级。这项研究使用田纳西州全州PreK随机实验的数据检验了这一假设，该数据发现PreK结束时的积极影响并未持续到幼儿园以后。这些数据与田纳西州正式评估系统中的教师观察结果和学校水平的增值得分相结合，以确定PreK对于在幼儿园至3年级之间处于较高质量学习环境中的亚组学生是否持续存在正面影响。接触高水平的老师或上高质量的学校本身不足以解释PreK参加者与3年级非参加者之间的成就差异。但是，这项研究发现有证据表明，这两者与PreK参与者在数学和ELA中的持久优势有关。但是，值得注意的是，PreK之后很少有儿童接触到高质量的学习环境，这表明要最大程度地利用PreK进行投资可能需要在PreK期间及以后关注学习环境的质量。