Nearly one in six students said they had shown up for class drunk at least once in the past year. 68 percent admitted they hit someone because they were angry. 47 percent said they could get a gun if they wanted to. A federal study of 16,000 kindergartners shows that when children attend academically rigorous preschools, they get the advanced reading, math and fine motor skills that allow them to enter first grade prepared to learn reading, writing and math. Kindergartners who attended pre-kindergarten or nursery school had significantly higher scores in all areas, including reading, math, general knowledge and fine motor skills, than children attending day care centers or Head Start.
All children gain from attending preschool, regardless of the type.
41 states support early education programs, ranging from Georgia, which offers preschool to all families, to states that provide extra money for Head Start programs for low-income students. These students are in the first class that must pass all four parts of the high school WASL in order to receive a diploma. 57 percent were successful in no more than two of the four test areas. The highest failure rate was in the math, where 58 percent did not meet the standard. The test, in its fifth year, is given each year to Washington's fourth, seventh and tenth grade students.