2025 Policy Recommendation
- Ensure Vermont’s Universal Prekindergarten Education (UPK) program continues to lead the country by maintaining universal access for 3- and 4-year-olds in a mixed-delivery system (school-based, center-based, and home-based programs) and centering the developmental needs of young children and their families. Renewed Policy Recommendation (2022, 2023)
- Task the Agency of Education, Child Development Division, and Building Bright Futures to create, implement, and update as necessary a monitoring and accountability protocol to better monitor Vermont’s Universal Prekindergarten Education (UPK), including robust data collection and analysis. The development of the process should include feedback from impacted communities and individuals (families, educators, Act 166 Coordinators, the Prekindergarten Education Implementation Committee, preK–12 administrators, etc.) and should be mindful of the additional capacity and skills reporting this data requires from programs. Collected data should include financial information, enrollment by student characteristics, staffing, and student outcomes.
- Secure sustained funding for personnel across all three entities to ensure high-quality data through the following activities: data management and reporting activities, training and TA to support quality collection and reporting, engagement in data integration meetings and visioning, data analysis, and making data publicly available.
What It Means
Vermont is seen as a national leader for its mixed-delivery pre-K program for children 3, 4, and 5 years of age not yet enrolled in kindergarten. As of 2023, the state ranked sixth in the country for access for 4-year-olds and second for access for 3-year-olds. During the 2022-2023 school year, universal pre-K enrollment was at 8,334. In June 2024, 42% of capacity for universal pre-K children was in school-based programs and 58% in private programs.
This year, the Prekindergarten Education Implementation Committee (PEIC) has been convened under the legislature’s charge to examine existing delivery of universal pre-K and make recommendations for expanding access for children through the public school system, private providers in contract with the school district, or both.
The BBF Network sees it as critical to continue our state’s commitment to serving both 3- and 4-year-olds in the program and maintaining the program’s mixed-delivery model, which aligns with national best practices and meets the varied needs of children and families. In addition to this commitment, increased resources and capacity are needed to build out a more robust system for monitoring and data collection work to understand and track over time key characteristics of the program, such as student outcomes, staffing, and student characteristics in order to ensure equitable access and program efficacy.
Why It Matters
Based on the experiences of families, early educators, and young children, the current universal pre-K system has many strengths to continue leaning into, especially its mixed-delivery model, which centers the developmental and varied needs of young children and families. Within the work of the PEIC, the need for stronger data and research systems has become increasingly apparent. Without investing more resources to collect needed data on pre-K, it will not be possible for the legislature to make data-informed decisions while considering expanding access to the program.
Connects to VECAP Goal 3:
All children and families have access to high-quality opportunities that meet their needs.
Spotlight on Equity
Access to high-quality preschool programs has long been known to support narrowing disparities in “achievement gaps” between Black and white children. Despite the pre-K programs outcomes, studies also show that Black children have less access to high-quality pre-K programs than their peers from other racial and ethnic groups.
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