SRCD State Policy Fellow Portfolio Abstracts: Robert Carr, M.A.

Portfolio Entry 1: Legislative Report

Project Overview:

Background: The State Legislature is interested in learning about key aspects of young children’s transition from preschool to kindergarten including the types of preschool to kindergarten transition activities occurring in communities across the state, research on transition practices, and systems for information-sharing between pre-kindergarten and kindergarten teachers.

Goal: To develop a legislative report outlining progress made by a state agency initiated pilot study that included the design and implementation of strategies to support children during the transition from preschool to kindergarten; with a specific focus on children enrolled in the state Pre-K program or receiving child care subsidy.

Contributions of Fellow:

• Participated in meetings about the pilot study.
• Conducted literature review.
• Prepared documents to highlight the alignment between preschool and kindergarten competencies for a school readiness tool.

Activity Focus Keywords: Literature Review, Evaluation, Written Report
Policy Area Keywords: Pre-kindergarten (Pre-K), Pre-kindergarten to Kindergarten Transition, Child Care Subsidy, School Readiness

Portfolio Entry 2: School Context Study

Project Overview:

Goal: To conduct an empirical study, referred to as the School Context Study, that examines whether the quality of children’s kindergarten classroom and elementary school environment enhance the impact of State Pre-K programming as measured by children’s kindergarten skills in the spring.

Contributions of Fellow:

• Conducted research project.
• Developed policy brief to be disseminated to early childhood education (ECE) stakeholders.
• Presented to agency leadership.
• Submitted results from research project for SRCD Biennial Conference and an academic journal.

Activity Focus Keywords: Administrative Data, Data Analysis, Written Report, Disseminate Findings, Presentation, Evaluation
Policy Area Keywords: Pre-kindergarten (Pre-K), Kindergarten Outcomes, Classroom Quality

Portfolio Entry 3: Study on County-Level Variation in Pre-K Expenditures

Project Overview:

Background: State agency staff are interested in understanding how more than 100 counties across the state differ in their use of early childhood education (ECE) funding.

Goal: To collect data and perform a policy analysis on public expenditures for early childhood education (ECE) programming in the state (e.g., the state Pre-K program, Title 1 Pre-K, the Head Start Pre-K program, and child care subsidy) in the service of creating maps that graphically illustrate public expenditures of ECE programming.

Contributions of Fellow:

• Conceptualized study design and identified the types of data and information needed to undertake the study.
• Coordinated data collection between multiple state government agencies as well as local and national administrative data sets.

Activity Focus Keywords: Data Collection, Administrative Data, Data Analysis, Policy Analysis, Data Visualization
Policy Area Keywords: Pre-kindergarten (Pre-K), Title 1 Pre-K, Head Start, Child Care Subsidy