High-quality early childhood education (ECE) offers a promising means of boosting both achievement and equity, yet districts and states across the nation face educator shortages, budget cuts, and inequities in accessibility. Given these challenges, along with the variable quality of ECE programs, policymakers and educators must ensure that limited resources are targeted toward the most effective programs. A new study by researchers from the University of Michigan, the National Bureau of Economic Research, Mathematica, and RAND investigates whether a relatively new model, dubbed “transitional kindergarten” (TK), leads to better outcomes for children in Michigan.
TK is essentially another public schooling option for the year that precedes kindergarten. Unlike most ECE options, it operates much like K–12. That is, TK students receive funding comparable to that of their K–12 counterparts, TK teachers must meet the same licensure requirements as K–12 teachers, and they are expected to follow a particular evidence-based curriculum. Further, and in stark contrast to many ECE teachers’ struggle to earn a living wage, TK teachers are compensated more like their K–12 peers. Over the last decade, public TK programs have been rolled out in California, Washington State, and Michigan. Until now, researchers had only studied California’s TK (finding either neutral or positive effects).
The present study is the first to take a closer look at TK outcomes in the Great Lakes State. There, children who turn five between September 2 and December 1 have three options: They can enroll in TK, waive into traditional kindergarten early, or pursue other public or private care. Relying on what researchers call regression discontinuity design, the study compares outcomes for TK and non-TK students with birthdays near the December 1 cutoff. The sample is limited to Michigan school districts that offer TK and to students who turned five in either 2014 or 2018. (The researchers exclude five-year-olds from the 2015–2017 cohorts because pandemic-era school closures interfered with subsequent testing.) Their model controls for demographic factors like sex, race, and economic disadvantage, and the key outcomes are third-grade math and English languages arts (ELA) test scores.
They find substantial academic benefit to TK. According to their calculations, it boosts third-grade math scores by 0.29 standard deviations and ELA scores by 0.19 standard deviations, compared to what would have been predicted for the same students starting kindergarten on time or later, attending public or private pre-K, or spending the year at home. One caveat is that, due to the study’s focus on children born shortly before and after the December 1 cutoff, these estimates reflect TK’s impact on students who are relatively “old” for their cohort.
Nonetheless, the findings offer promising evidence supporting TK, especially given that third-grade test scores are, for better or for worse, accurate predictors of academic performance nearly a decade later. States and districts looking to boost student achievement, especially as young children continue to struggle academically, may want to follow Michigan’s lead.
Unfortunately, the very factors that likely make TK so beneficial—qualified teachers, fair teacher pay, high-quality curriculum—also make it expensive. The TK year itself comes at significant additional cost, of course. There is also the fact that some families choosing TK for their children would otherwise have chosen early entrance to kindergarten; in these cases, the TK option thus adds another year of public education to the tab. Especially because TK participation has no income cap (at least in Michigan), private ECE providers may also push back against efforts to expand the program. Policymakers considering TK will therefore have to weigh fiscal and political concerns against the growing body of evidence supporting the new program.
SOURCE: Jordan S. Berne, Brian A. Jacob, Tareena Musaddiq, Anna Shapiro, and Christina Weiland, “The Effect of Early Childhood Programs on Third-Grade Test Scores: Evidence from Transitional Kindergarten in Michigan,” National Bureau of Economic Research Working Paper Series (April 2024).
