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• Findings in developmental science provide the rationale for the hypothesis that a year of publicly-funded pre-k might promote both school readiness and longer-term educational success. Neuroscientists have estimated that the brain grows at an astounding rate over the first several years of life, reaching about 80 percent of its ultimate adult volum...
• In recent years, families across the entire income spectrum have experienced increasing stress due to such challenges as making financial ends meet, working multiple jobs, and/or raising a child as a single parent.
• The number of children in public pre-kindergarten nearly tripled between 1990 and 2005 but since then has changed only minimally.
• Many states have pre- kindergarten programs that only or disproportionately serve four-year-olds, so 29 percent of four-year-olds were served compared to 5 percent of three-year-olds. 9
• There is wide variation in nearly all aspects of public pre- kindergarten programs, including the size and availability of programs across states and cities.10 In addition to eight states that do not have any public pre-kindergarten, another 10 serve less than 5 percent of the three- and four-year-olds in their states. Eleven states served more tha...

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