The Office of the Administration for Children & Families reports that paying for child care can place a burden on households, especially those with low incomes. Currently, there is a dearth of knowledge regarding whether households obtain higher-quality child care when they pay higher prices for that care. To that end, this research brief uses … Read more
This Snapshot identifies the nonparental care arrangements lower-income households, with at least one working parent, use to care for children under age 6 (not yet in kindergarten). This Snapshot is based on data from the 2012 National Survey of Early Care and Education (NSECE) household survey, a nationally representative survey of households with children under … Read more
New research from the Administration for Children and Families explores the relationship between the price of center-based child care and measures of quality in those centers. Using data from the 2021 National Survey of Early Care and Education, the authors find that there is little relationship between reported prices and quality of care measures: for … Read more
In advance of anticipated attention to school segregation under the Biden administration, a new piece from the Brookings Institution identifies a less explored axis of segregation: that of English Learners (ELs). Making up 10 percent of students nationwide, these learners are most often elementary school aged, and disproportionately concentrated in high-poverty schools. Specifically, ELs are … Read more
Scholars from the Brookings Institution collected data on 2017-2018 high school graduation rates from 37 states (including Maine) and found that despite interstate variation in overall graduation rates, in each state assessed, boys graduation rates were lower than girls (82 versus 88 percent overall). The U.S. Department of Education requires states to report overall graduation … Read more
More than one fifth of all college students are parents, who may be at risk of being pushed out of school by a system not designed to accommodate their needs. Parenting students often earn higher GPAs than their classmates without children, but are less likely to complete their degrees. Less than one third of mothers … Read more
AECF reports on child well-being prior to the start of the COVID-19 pandemic in March 2020, How adults with children in the household are faring during COVID-19, Federal and state responses to support families and children during the pandemic, and Strategies for meeting the needs of children and families now and following the pandemic. #childcare … Read more
Racial and ethnic, linguistic, and cultural diversity in early care and education (ECE) settings are emerging as critically important aspects of provider quality. Young children from a variety of racial and ethnic, cultural, and linguistic backgrounds benefit from culturally diverse experiences in the classroom, as well as experiences that support their households cultural background. This … Read more
A recent study in the Journal of Labor Economics evaluated the long-term impacts of Head Start on participants education and income in adulthood. The researchers used data from the National Longitudinal Study of Youth 1979, a random sample of individuals aged 14-22 in 1979, until they were in their early 30s in 1994. About one-quarter … Read more
The state of Maine has sixteen Head Start grantees, operating eleven Head Start (HS) programs, three American Indian & Alaska Native Head Start (AIAN HS) programs, and thirteen Early Head Start (EHS) programs (see Table 1). In the 20152016 program year, sites operated by these sixteen grantees served 4,126 children and pregnant women. The majority … Read more
