Description:
This policy brief describes one state's experience using child assessment data to evaluate the quality of early childhood providers. In 2005, Florida introduced its Voluntary Prekindergarten (VPK) program, a free, universal preschool initiative. VPK currently serves about 75 percent of the state's 4-year-olds, and is a national leader with respect to preschool access. Since its inception, Florida has evaluated the quality of VPK programs based on their participants' score on an assessment administered at the beginning of kindergarten. This memo describes Florida's unique approach to program-level accountability and also highlights some potential unintended consequences of Florida's early childhood accountability system. In particular, we focus on the lack of a pre-test and the related possibility of mislabeling programs "low performing." (author abstract)
Resource Type:
Fact Sheets & Briefs
Publisher(s):