On the Road to High-Quality Early Learning

This timely book will help policymakers and practitioners convert their visions of high-quality early education into on-the-ground reality by providing a much-needed, richly detailed look at how states can design, fund, and manage exemplary programs. The authors describe and analyze how four states—Michigan, West Virginia, Washington, and North Carolina—have built early education systems that positively affect student outcomes. Sharing a commitment to advancing key elements of a quality preschool education, each of the states developed programs with different enrollment requirements, services, and oversight. All of them, however, rely on common overarching strategies, such as: establishing standards and supporting improvement, investing in knowledgeable educators, coordinating and aligning early education programs with elementary school, seeking sufficient funding sources and mechanisms, and building broad-based support. This book offers powerful lessons for anyone who is committed to delivering engaging, age-appropriate preschool programs for all.

“This book is so valuable—it’s a ‘how-to’ for the current generation of political leaders, Republicans and Democrats alike, who want to develop early education policies and practices that work.”
—James B. Hunt, Jr., former Governor of North Carolina

“This book provides critical insights for addressing the key challenge to preschool policy: fulfilling preschool’s promise at scale.”
—W. Steven Barnett, National Institute for Early Education Research (NIEER)

“A great resource for everybody engaged in state-level processes on behalf of young children, providing valuable lessons from leading states to help other states chart their own path.”
—Elliot Regenstein, Foresight Law + Policy

“A detailed and fascinating account of how distributive leadership, collaboration, and professional learning can greatly and positively influence teachers’ effective use of data.”
—Randi Weingarten, president, American Federation of Teachers