For Release on Delivery

Expected at 9:30 a.m.

Tuesday, April 11, 2000

GAO/T-HEHS-00-83

PRESCHOOL EDUCATION

Federal Investment for

Low-Income Children

Significant but

Effectiveness Unclear

Statement of Marnie S. Shaul, Associate Director

Education, Workforce, and Income Security Issues

Health, Education, and Human Services Division

Testimony

Before the Subcommittee on Children and Families,

Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions,

U.S. Senate

United States General Accounting Office

GAO
Page 1 GAO/T-HEHS-00-83

Mr. Chairman and Members of the Subcommittee:

We are pleased to be here today to discuss the importance of preschool

education for children of low-income families. Over the past several years,

members of the Congress and leaders in state government have expressed

concern about the number of children who are coming to school not ready

to learn because they lack appropriate cognitive and social skills. The first

national education goal is that all children in America will start school

ready to learn.1 Both federal and state governments have programs to help

low-income preschool children obtain these skills. Given the significant

federal commitment, it is important to have information on the

effectiveness of the federal programs.

My remarks today focus on (1) the federal and state commitment to

preschool programs, including funding and collaborative efforts and (2)

what is known about the effectiveness of federal preschool programs. My

comments are based on the findings from our recent report on early

childhood care and education and our two reports on the effectiveness of

federal early childhood programs.2

In summary, the federal investment in preschool programs for low-income

children is considerable. Annually, the federal government provides about

$4.6 billion in funds for preschool education and about $4.4 billion a year

for federal block grants, such as the Child Care Development Fund

(CCDF), some portion of which is used for preschool education.3 State

governments provide about another $2 billion annually to support

preschool programs. Head Start, administered by the Department of

Health and Human Services (HHS), and Even Start, administered by the

Department of Education, are two federal programs that focus on

developing cognitive and other skills needed to prepare children for

school. In addition, in some communities title I funds, which support

elementary and secondary education programs for economically and

educationally disadvantaged children, are also used for preschool

programs. Federally funded and state-funded preschool programs typically

serve children only part of a day and thus do not always accommodate the

1The national goals were enacted into law in 1994 (20 U.S.C. 5812).

2Education and Care: Early Childhood Programs and Services for Low-Income Families (GAO/HEHS00-11, Nov. 15, 1999), Early Childhood Programs: Characteristics Affect the Availability of School

Readiness Information (GAO/HEHS-00-38, Feb. 20, 2000), and Evaluations of Even Start Family

Literacy Program Effectiveness (GAO/HEHS-00-58R, Mar. 7, 2000).

3The main federal block grant programs that support child care are CCDF, the Social Services Block

Grant (SSBG), and Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF).

Preschool Education: Federal Investment for

Low-Income Children Significant but

Effectiveness Unclear
Preschool Education: Federal Investment

for Low-Income Children Significant but

Effectiveness Unclear

Page 2 GAO/T-HEHS-00-83

schedules of working parents. In some states, federal and state officials

have collaborated to provide full-day services by bringing together both

child care and preschool services.

Given the considerable investment at the federal level, it is important to

know how effectively the different programs prepare children for school.

Although Head Start and Even Start studies have shown that the skills of

participating children have improved, the studies have not provided

definitive results on effectiveness—that is, the extent to which these

improvements can be attributed to the programs. However, HHS and

Education are making progress in assessing the effectiveness of their

preschool programs. In contrast, the effectiveness of block grant funds is

not being evaluated for school readiness because it is not a primary goal of

these programs.

Research shows that to be prepared for school, children need early

childhood experiences that foster their physical, emotional, social, and

cognitive development. However, the early childhood of many low-income

children does not include these experiences, and such deficiencies can

adversely affect their school readiness. Research also indicates that lowincome children can make developmental gains by attending high-quality

early childhood programs that provide preschool services.4 In their

strategies to improve educational readiness for low-income children,

federal and state governments invest in different kinds of early childhood

education and child care programs.

In addition to their role in preparing children for school, these programs

play a part in allowing parents to enter the workforce. Welfare reform

legislation is directed at increasing low-income families’ reliance on work

rather than welfare. But many parents who work need full-day, full-year

care for their children. To use preschool programs, which often serve

children part of a day and part of a year, parents need some type of child

care to cover the additional hours they work. Child care settings vary and

include care given by relatives or nonrelatives in a home or in a center or

other out-of-home settings. For families that use subsidized care, recent

HHS data showed that about half of these families use center-based

settings for their children, which often include educational services, and

4We are referring here to a body of research conducted over the years by academia, research

organizations, and federal agencies, such as the National Institute on Early Childhood Development

and Education

Background
Preschool Education: Federal Investment

for Low-Income Children Significant but

Effectiveness Unclear

Page 3 GAO/T-HEHS-00-83

the remainder place their children in home-based settings. Information

about what services children receive in home-based settings is limited.

Historically, early childhood care programs and early childhood education

programs have existed as separate systems with different goals. The

primary goal of child care programs has been to subsidize the cost of care

for low-income parents who are working or engaged in education and

training activities. At the federal level, child care is primarily supported by

CCDF. In contrast, early childhood education programs have generally

focused on helping children become ready to begin school. This split is

also reflected at the state level in child care subsidy programs and

preschool programs.

In fiscal year 1999, the federal government provided approximately $4.6

billion through three major programs—Head Start, Even Start, and title I—

to fund preschool programs targeted to low-income children. These

programs have as a major focus providing services that promote school

readiness.5 Some of the funds from the major federal block grant programs

that subsidize child care for low-income families may also support

preschool education. In addition, states spent about $2 billion to support

preschool education through their own programs and through

supplemental funding to Head Start.6 Most preschool programs are partday programs, so some states are using collaboration initiatives between

preschool and day care programs to address the needs of working parents

for full-day care.

Of the three programs, Head Start is the largest and serves the most

children. HHS’s Head Start program provided $4.3 billion in federal

government spending on preschool programs in fiscal year 1999.

Education’s Even Start program provided $135 million primarily to support

literacy programs for preschool children and their families. Title I, also

administered by Education, is a $7.8 billion flexible grant program that is

designed to help educationally disadvantaged children from low-income

families. Although current funding amounts for the preschool part of title I

5CCDF provided about $3.2 billion in 1999 to subsidize the cost of child care for low-income families.

Families can choose preschool, center-based, or home-based settings with these funds. CCDF does not

have an explicit goal of providing services to promote school readiness, but the funds can be used for

care that does provide these services.

6For the most part, this represents state funds spent during a state’s last complete fiscal year at the

time of the survey (January 1999).

Federal and State

Funds for Preschool

Are Significant

Federally Supported

Preschool Programs
Preschool Education: Federal Investment

for Low-Income Children Significant but

Effectiveness Unclear

Page 4 GAO/T-HEHS-00-83

are not available, Education estimated that in the 1996-97 school year,

about 2 percent of children served by the program were of preschool age.

Table 1 describes the programs and their funding levels.

Table 1: Head Start, Even Start, and Title I Programs

Program Department

Fiscal year 1999

appropriations

($ in millions)Description

Head Start HHS $4,311aHead Start’s primary goal is to promote school readiness by enhancing the

social and cognitive development of low-income preschool children

(generally aged 3 and 4) by providing health, educational, nutritional, social,

and other services that are determined through a needs assessment to be

necessary. The services are delivered locally by public and private nonprofit

agencies that receive funding directly from HHS. In fiscal year 1999, Head

Start served more than 831,000 children.

Even Start Education $135 Even Start Family Literacy Program’s purpose is to help reduce poverty and

illiteracy by improving educational opportunities for families. The program

integrates early childhood education, adult literacy and basic education, and

parenting education into a family literacy program. The rationale is that

children will benefit directly from their participation in early childhood

education programs and indirectly from their parents’ literacy and parenting

skills. Education distributes grants to states, which then make subgrants to

partnerships consisting of at least one local education agency and at least

one community-based organization, higher education institution, or other

public or private nonprofit agency. During the 1998-99 program year, 735

local Even Start projects served approximately 32,000 families.

Title I Education $155b Title I’s primary purpose is to help local education agencies and schools

improve the teaching and learning of children failing, or most at risk of

failing, to meet challenging state academic standards. Local education

agencies received $7.8 billion in title I funds, a formula grant, and have

broad discretion in using funds. For example, the funds may be used to pay

for teachers’ salaries, provide professional development, or purchase new

equipment such as computers. Education has encouraged state title I

directors to use title I funds for early learning programs that improve school

readiness. Title I served about 264,000 preschool children in 1996-97 (about

2 percent of all children title I served that year). a

Represents funding for Head Start preschool programs only.

b

Education did not have information on the proportion of title I funds used for preschool

children. Using the figure from 1996-97 that about 2 percent of title I children were

preschool as a rough estimate, about $155 million would have gone to preschool

programs.

The major federal block grant programs that support child care are

primarily focused on providing access to child care so that parents can

work or obtain training and education for employment. These programs

Federal Block Grant

Programs
Preschool Education: Federal Investment

for Low-Income Children Significant but

Effectiveness Unclear

Page 5 GAO/T-HEHS-00-83

generally support care for children from birth to 13 years in a wide variety

of child care settings, such as preschool, home care, or center care. The

three major block grants are CCDF, Social Services Block Grant (SSBG),

and Temporary Assistance to Needy Families (TANF). Together they

provide about $4.4 billion for day care services. SSBG estimates that $252

million was spent on child care in 1997, states reported $899 million in

transfers and direct expenditures for child care in 1998 from TANF, and in

1999 CCDF was funded at $3.2 billion.

CCDF is aimed primarily at increasing the availability, affordability, and

quality of child care; preschool readiness is not a primary goal. The two

other grant programs have child care as a service secondary to other

primary goals. SSBG funds can be used for services directed at the goals of

achieving or maintaining economic self-support and self-sufficiency;

preventing or remedying neglect, abuse, and exploitation of children and

adults; and preventing or reducing inappropriate institutional care. TANF’s

main goal is to achieve and maintain self-sufficiency in the workplace, and

federal funds can be used for child care to help achieve that goal.

The extent to which block grant funds are used for preschool-aged

children is not currently available. These grants fund a wide variety of

services and serve children up to age 13 in a variety of settings, and HHS

does not collect data separately for preschool education. In our early

childhood report, we reported on preliminary HHS data on the types of

care being used for children subsidized by federal block grants. The data

indicate that on average about 11 percent of the children are cared for in

their homes, 30 percent are in family child care (that is, a small number of

children, usually fewer than 10, are cared for in the home of the provider),

4 percent are in group homes (that is, care is given in the home of a

provider for a larger number of children, generally more than 10), and 55

percent are using centers. Children receiving these services may also be

receiving services that help them prepare for school, even though that is

not the goal of the block grant program.
Preschool Education: Federal Investment

for Low-Income Children Significant but

Effectiveness Unclear

Page 6 GAO/T-HEHS-00-83

In our recent report on early childhood education and care, we stated that

31 states and the District of Columbia reported that they provided about

$1.7 billion in their last complete fiscal year to support preschool

programs.7 Many of these preschool programs were operated as part of the

public school system and were part-time programs. Fifteen states also

reported providing $155 million to supplement the Head Start program.

These supplemental funds were used to serve more children, increase

teacher salaries, or provide transportation to Head Start facilities.

Nineteen states reported providing additional funds through grants to

communities to meet parents’ needs, which could include early childhood

education, child care, or both. These 19 states reported spending $1.7

billion on these grants.8

Because both Head Start and state-funded preschool programs are

generally part-time programs, some states and localities have used

collaboration initiatives to address working parents’ needs for full-day

coverage. Two of the four states we visited in 1999, Colorado and Ohio,

had collaboration initiatives that combined federal and state funds from a

variety of sources to increase the availability of child care and education

settings for low-income families and to provide a full day of services. For

example, in Colorado, the Community Consolidated Child Care Pilot

Program required participating pilot communities to consolidate funding

from at least two different sources: the Colorado Preschool Program,

operated under the authority of local school districts, and child care funds

administered by local boards of county commissioners. Colorado officials

reported a larger increase in the number of children served in pilot

counties than elsewhere in the state. According to the director of one pilot

collaboration project, the project’s efforts have enabled it to meet the need

for care and education, including full-day care, for 3- to 5-year-olds.

Likewise, in Ohio, the Early Childhood Coordination Committee was

charged with bringing Ohio’s Head Start program, which is Ohio’s public

preschool program, and its subsidized child care program into a

coordinated system of care. By combining the state’s Head Start with child

care funds, the state has enabled children in poor working families to

receive full-day services.

7Of 50 states surveyed, 49 states and the District of Columbia responded to our survey on early

childhood education and care. Thirty-one states and the District of Columbia indicated that they had

preschool programs and that these were state programs (separate from Head Start programs). We

excluded programs funded by a state match to a federal program and programs with limited eligibility,

such as programs only for children of teenagers.

8Funds spent on preschool were not separated out, and many of the grants were directed toward the

CCDF program.

Most States Provide

Funding for Preschool

Programs

Collaboration Efforts

Helped Meet the Need for

Full-Day Services
Preschool Education: Federal Investment

for Low-Income Children Significant but

Effectiveness Unclear

Page 7 GAO/T-HEHS-00-83

Federal programs also have supported collaborative efforts. For example,

since 1990, HHS has been awarding collaboration grants to states to

promote more integrated service delivery systems. These grants are

designed to encourage collaboration between Head Start and other

programs to increase the availability of full-day coverage and increase the

number of children served. Further, the Congress increased Head Start

funding in fiscal year 1998-99, and Head Start has awarded much of this

money to programs that consider combining their funds with other child

care and early childhood funding sources. This helps deliver more full-day

services through partnerships such as community-based child care

centers.

In recent reviews, we found that limited information is available on how

effective federal programs are in preparing preschool children for school.

HHS and Education are making progress in evaluating Head Start and

Even Start, but definitive data on the effectiveness of these programs are

not yet available. Education currently has no data on title I’s effectiveness

in preparing preschool children for school but is developing an evaluation

plan to address this. Because the block grant programs do not have school

readiness as a goal, HHS has not evaluated their effect on school

readiness.

Recent data on outcomes for the Head Start program show that

participating children exhibit many of the skills thought to indicate

readiness to learn in school.9 For example, the data show that typical 4-

year-olds completing Head Start had mastered many of the skills and

behaviors on which they were tested to assess their readiness for school,

such as increased vocabulary, but they did not possess other skills and

behaviors, such as identifying letters. These data provide an indication

that Head Start children have some school readiness skills, but because

most of the studies did not use a control group to enable a comparison of

Head Start outcomes with outcomes for non-Head Start participants, they

did not provide conclusive evidence on whether children’s having school

readiness skills stemmed from being in Head Start.

9To collect the data needed to assess program outcomes, as captured by the Head Start performance

measures, HHS’ Head Start Bureau funded the Family and Child Experiences Survey (FACES) in 1996.

FACES collects performance measures data from a nationally representative sample of Head Start

programs, children, and families. Specifically, FACES collects data on the cognitive, social, emotional,

and physical development of Head Start children; the characteristics, well-being, and accomplishments

of Head Start families; the quality of Head Start classrooms; and the characteristics and opinions of

Head Start teachers and other program staff. Data collection began in 1997 and has recently been

extended to follow children into the first grade.

Limited Information Is

Available on Program

Effectiveness

Head Start
Preschool Education: Federal Investment

for Low-Income Children Significant but

Effectiveness Unclear

Page 8 GAO/T-HEHS-00-83

HHS is now taking steps to determine the extent to which these outcomes

can be attributed to Head Start. In the Head Start Amendments of 1998, the

Congress mandated a national impact study of Head Start. The law defined

impact to mean that Head Start children had enhancements in their

readiness for school that would not have occurred without their

participation in the program. In accordance with the legislation, HHS

established an expert panel to recommend a research design. The panel

recommended that the study include a random assignment of families to

Head Start or control groups as the best approach to answer the question

of outcomes. HHS plans to implement the panel’s recommendations

through procurements awarded this year. The Congress required that the

study be completed by 2003.

Even Start has undergone two national evaluations, and a third is under

way. Data collected for the first two evaluations showed that children

participating in Even Start achieved positive outcomes. For example, in

the first evaluation, Even Start children’s scores on a test that measures

school readiness skills increased by more than double the expected rate of

learning, based on normal child development.10 This test measured skills

such as identifying shapes and colors and understanding numerical

concepts.

While the first evaluation showed positive outcomes for children, it did not

show conclusively that the children’s improved scores resulted from their

being in Even Start. The researchers examined program effect by

comparing the performance of families randomly assigned to Even Start

projects and a control group.11 The data showed that during their early

participation in the program, Even Start children gained more than the

control group children. However, after 18 months there was no statistical

difference between children in Even Start and children in the control

group. According to the evaluation researchers, two possible explanations

may be that by 18 months (1) most of the children assigned to the control

group participated in some other type of early childhood program and (2)

nearly half of the children who had been participating in Even Start had

left the program when the test was administered to them, limiting the

10Specifically, Even Start children gained at the rate of 0.91 test items per month, compared with the

expected rate of 0.40 items per month. The study’s researchers said that this could be considered a

medium-sized effect by general standards of social science evaluations.

11The random assignment of families was limited to five sites, with a total of 100 families in the Even

Start program and 100 families in the control group. Families in the control group could not receive

Even Start services but could receive other services available in the community.

Even Start
Preschool Education: Federal Investment

for Low-Income Children Significant but

Effectiveness Unclear

Page 9 GAO/T-HEHS-00-83

program’s potential to affect their readiness for school. The second

national evaluation of Even Start did not assess whether the program was

responsible for children’s gains in test scores.

Education is currently conducting a third national evaluation to try to

answer the question of Even Start’s effectiveness. As with the first

evaluation, it is randomly assigning families to allow for an assessment of

program effectiveness.12 This evaluation will cover program years 1997-98

to 2000-01. Study results will be presented in a report to be issued in June

2002.

Education has no current information available to determine title I’s effect

on children’s school readiness. In its 1998-2002 strategic plan, Education

cited school readiness as one of its objectives and identified title I as a

program supporting this objective. However, performance indicators for

title I in Education’s fiscal year 2000 annual performance plan did not

address school readiness; rather, they addressed how the program

supports other objectives directed primarily at school-age children, such

as the use of challenging content standards by title I schools. Similarly,

Education’s national review of title I reported on the progress of schoolage students but did not address the results of the program for preschool

children.13 To begin to assess title I’s support of school readiness,

Education in its 2001 performance plan has included title I’s effect on

language development, reading readiness, and mathematical concepts as

an indicator that addresses school readiness. Education officials also

recently said that they are developing an evaluation plan for the use of title

I funds for preschool programs that will provide data to measure progress

in meeting its preschool indicator.

HHS has not conducted any evaluations and does not have information

that could be used to determine CCDF’s effect on children’s school

readiness. In HHS’ Administration for Children and Families (ACF) fiscal

12In the fall of 1999, the random assignment of families was being implemented in 11 sites. Education

is considering the possibility of adding more sites to the study beginning fall 2000.

13See Education, Promising Results, Continuing Challenges: The Final Report of the National

Assessment of Title I (Washington D.C.: 1999). An earlier Education study examined children’s

experiences in prekindergarten classrooms funded by chapter I (later changed to title I) as the

program operated before the last reauthorization. Among the study’s findings were that these

classrooms were of acceptable to good quality and were less likely to operate full-day programs. The

study also tried to examine the relationship between classroom characteristics and outcomes for

children but was not able to draw any strong conclusions. See Education, Observational Study of Early

Childhood Programs, Vol. II, Chapter 1 Funded Early Childhood Programs (Washington, D.C.: 1993).

Title I

Block Grant Programs
Preschool Education: Federal Investment

for Low-Income Children Significant but

Effectiveness Unclear

Page 10 GAO/T-HEHS-00-83

year 2000 performance plan, one of the agency’s objectives is to increase

the quality of child care to promote childhood development. The agency’s

current performance indicators for this goal focus on ways of improving

the quality of care but do not address outcomes for children. The TANF

program provides a wide range of services that promote self-sufficiency,

including subsidizing the cost of child care for families. Information

available on TANF’s funding for child care was focused primarily on

demographic and services characteristics. These data are not sufficient to

determine the program’s effect on children’s school readiness. The data

collected for SSBG generally focus on services the states provide with

SSBG funds and do not address specific outcomes, such as school

readiness.

The challenges of assessing the effectiveness of federal early childhood

programs help explain why only limited information is currently available.

• Young children are often better at demonstrating what they know by

showing than by talking or writing, making traditional paper and pencil

tests inadequate. Thus, researchers emphasize the need to use a variety of

assessment tools, including ratings by teachers and parents and direct

observation of children’s behavior.

• Young children learn and develop so quickly that assessments given at any

one point in time may not provide a complete picture of their learning.

• Children’s language proficiency can undermine the validity of the results

of assessments, especially for children who come from homes with limited

exposure to English.

• Assessing the effectiveness of flexible grant programs such as title I is

complicated because an evaluation at the national level requires uniform

activities and consistent program measures, characteristics that these

programs generally do not have.14

• Funds from early childhood education and care programs are often

commingled with other federal state, local, and private funds for delivering

services in a preschool setting, making it difficult to isolate the effect of

one program’s funding.

14See Grant Programs: Design Features Shape Flexibility, Accountability, and Performance

Information (GAO/GGD-98-137, June 22, 1998).

Challenges in Assessing

Effectiveness
Preschool Education: Federal Investment

for Low-Income Children Significant but

Effectiveness Unclear

Page 11 GAO/T-HEHS-00-83

Finally, measuring program effectiveness can present ethical challenges.

Most researchers believe that comparison group studies—those that

randomly assign study participants to either a treatment or a control

group—provide the most certain information about program effectiveness.

However, assigning children to an unserved control group could seem

unfair and can affect the willingness of local projects to participate in

national evaluations. All these reasons make it difficult for federal

agencies to assess the effectiveness of their programs in improving

children’s school readiness. The latest evaluations that Education and

HHS are undertaking are attempting to address some of these issues.

Mr. Chairman, this concludes my statement. I will be happy to answer any

questions you or Members of the Subcommittee may have.

(104997)
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