Weekly E-News
New Resources Dive into State of Preschool Survey Data
June 12, 2026
Hot Topics
NIEER has released two brand new resources designed for researchers, policymakers, advocates, and other stakeholders seeking a deeper understanding of state preschool policies and programs:
2024-2025 State of Preschool Survey Data (Appendix A)
Appendix A is NIEER’s 2025 State of Preschool comprehensive data set containing information beyond what is found in the report’s state profile pages. It includes responses to all State of Preschool survey questions and covers a large range of preschool policies, including detailed data tables that are not included in the main report.
Topics addressed in the Appendix include:
- Access and Enrollment
- Program Operating Schedule
- Preschool Eligibility Criteria
- Preschool Program Standards
- Early Learning and Development Standards
- Curriculum
- Preschool Child Assessments
- Workforce and Compensation
- Resources and Funding
- Accountability
- Outdoor/Nature-Based Learning
New Policy Brief: State pre-K enrollment pre- and post-pandemic
Expanding access to state pre-K is one approach states can take to encourage families to enroll and persist in the public school system, and to combat budget shortfalls related to declining K-12 enrollment. NIEER's latest policy brief looks at enrollment trends pre- and post-pandemic in both state-funded preschool and K-3. The new brief is authored by Rachel Fidel, Allison Friedman-Krauss, and Steve Barnett.
The proportion of 4-year-olds enrolled in state-funded pre-K programs doubled between 2002 and 2010. However, pre-K enrollment growth slowed by the late 2010s; simultaneously, enrollment in public kindergarten to third grade (K-3) began to decline in many states. Enrollment in both state pre-K and public K-3 fell during the COVID-19 pandemic.
State pre-K enrollment has surpassed pre-pandemic levels nationally but this varies greatly by state, while public K-3 enrollment remains below pre-pandemic levels nationally. However, stagnation in state pre-K growth and decline in public K-3 enrollment may not be entirely attributable to the pandemic, as 2024-2025 enrollment rates are very close to where they would be if pre-pandemic trends had continued.
Kara E. McGoey, Stephany Panza, Rachel Fridley, Veronica Derickson, Emily Kurland, and Reva Mathieu, writing in the Journal of Behavioral Education, conducted a meta- analysis of 12 studies examining school based interventions for preschool children exhibiting ADHD related behaviors. Across multiple research designs, the findings showed moderate positive effects in reducing problem behaviors in classroom settings. Single subject studies demonstrated particularly strong effects, and interventions targeting disruptive behavior achieved large improvement rates. Function-based interventions, which address the underlying causes of behavior, produced the strongest outcomes, providing strong support for their use in preschool educational settings to improve behavior and classroom functioning.
NIEER Activity
The Real Cost of Rolling Back Head Start Wage Requirements
A new NIEER policy brief concludes that rolling back Head Start wage requirements could reduce Head Start's capacity to fulfill its mission. On May 12, 2026, the Office of Head Start published a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (NPRM) proposing to rescind 2024 Head Start teacher wage regulations. The regulations required the creation of wage scales and progress toward pay parity by 2031, with Head Start salaries reaching public pre-K levels or 90% of kindergarten teacher pay.
The new report, "The Real Cost of Rolling Back Head Start Wage Requirements," authored by NIEER’s Morgan Healy, Rachel Fidel, and Steve Barnett, sheds light on the relationships linking inadequate teacher pay to staff shortages, lower quality, and weaker child outcomes. It includes state-by-state data, including comparisons between Head Start and K-12 teacher salaries.
NIEER in the News
A new report from the National Institute for Early Education Research found that the Grand Canyon State is among the states with the fewest supportive policies in place for students who are learning English at the same time as they are speaking another language at home, which hampers their ability to succeed in the long run.
The National Institute for Early Education Research reports that in the 2024-25 school year, Kentucky preschool enrolled 18,837 children — a decrease of 900 from the previous year.
Focus on New Jersey Weekly Feature
BELLE’s Spring Conference Brings Together Hundreds of ECE Educators to Strengthen Dual Language Instruction
NIEER's Building Early Learning Latiné Educators (BELLE) initiative hosted hundreds of early childhood educators and leaders from across New Jersey at its June 5 Spring Conference, "Strengthening Dual Language Practice: Talk, Play, and Reading to Enhance Children's Development." Highlights included keynote speaker Lisa Lopez, author of "Teaching Dual Language Learners: What Early Childhood Educators Need To Know." Dr. Ximena Franco-Jenkins discussed bilingualism as an asset, and NIEER's Elise Genao presented research on translanguaging with Orange Public Schools' Susan Morales.
Attendees heard insights from on-the-ground DLL strategies implemented for preschoolers in school districts across the state, including New Brunswick, Elizabeth, Perth Amboy, Jersey City, Union City, and Passaic. NIEER's Carmen Espinosa presented a session with Bernadette Velez of Passaic Public Schools sharing how lending libraries can be embedded within a broader goal-oriented family engagement system that honors families’ knowledge and supports bilingual language development.
Do you know a bilingual teacher who shines as a natural leader? NIEER is proud to offer new 2026-2027 BELLE Cohorts in both Camden and New Brunswick. Nominate them for this special professional development opportunity designed to refine leaderships skills and empower future ECE bilingual leaders.
Click here to learn more and nominate educators for the new BELLE cohorts.
International Journal of Child Care and Education Policy (IJCCEP) Weekly Feature
Nina Hogrebe and Stefan Schulder examined ethnic segregation in German early childhood education and care settings, focusing on whether parent initiative day care centers differ in their enrollment of children from non-German language backgrounds. Using data from 572 centers and multivariate regression analyses, the authors found that parent initiatives enrolled significantly fewer children with non-German language origins, averaging 8 percentage points lower than other providers even after accounting for other factors. The study identified selective enrollment practices, high levels of parental involvement, specific pedagogical approaches, and limited access to specially trained staff as factors associated with this pattern.
Publish in the International Journal of Child Care and Education Policy (IJCCEP)
- It’s FREE – article processing charges for all articles published in the journal are fully sponsored.
- The journal is indexed by Emerging Sources Citation Index (ESCI) and by Scopus.
- All articles are published under the Creative Commons Attribution License 4.0 license. Authors will retain copyright.
ECE Research
Litna A. Varghese, Gagan Bajaj, Megha Mohan, Jayashree S. Bhat, Jayashree Kanthila, and Aiswarya Liz Varghese, writing in Multimodal Technologies and Interaction, conducted a scoping review of 26 studies to examine how parents communicate with young children during Joint Media Engagement (JME), the shared use of digital media by children and caregivers. The review identified 15 communication strategies organized into five categories, with Social Learning approaches being the most common and consistently linked to improvements in children's language, cognitive, and socioemotional development. The authors also found that JME practices vary according to factors such as parent characteristics, geographic location, device type, media content, and child attributes. The findings suggest that the quality of parent child interaction during screen use is a key factor in supporting positive developmental outcomes and highlight the need for more rigorous research to inform evidence-based parent coaching and digital media practices in early childhood.
Sabina Barrios Fernández, Diana Salas Gómez, Dulce Romero Ayuso, and Margarita Gozalo Delgado, writing in the Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders, examined the effectiveness of the Basic Activities of Daily Living Evaluation Preschool Version (BADL P) as a tool for assessing functional performance in preschool children on the autism spectrum. The study included 281 children ages 3 to 6, including 40 children with autism, and evaluated skills related to eating, personal hygiene, dressing, and daily functioning. Children on the autism spectrum scored significantly lower across all areas, with particularly large differences observed in dressing and personal hygiene. The BADL P demonstrated strong ability to distinguish between autistic and non-autistic children.
Preschool Science Teaching in Head Start Classrooms
Rachel A. Larimore, Christina V. Schwarz, Laurie A. Van Egeren, KyungSook Lee, Hope K. Gerde, Shelly Van Huis, and colleagues, writing in Early Education and Development, examined science teaching practices in 70 Head Start classrooms using the Science Teacher Observation Protocol for Preschool (SciTOP-P). The researchers found that teachers spent more time using management related language than science related language and that science instruction most often involved helping children observe and investigate phenomena, with less emphasis on explaining findings or engaging in broader science and engineering practices.
Effects of Representational Gestures on Preschool Children’s Story Comprehension and Word Learning
Elara Lutz and Jan Lenhart, writing in the Journal of Early Childhood Education Research, investigated whether representational gestures used during storytelling improve preschool children's story comprehension and vocabulary learning. The study included 89 German children ages 3 to 6 who watched a videotaped story presented either with or without gestures. Children who viewed the version with representational gestures demonstrated significantly better story comprehension as well as stronger receptive and expressive word learning than children who viewed the story without gestures.
Opportunities
The LEGO Foundation Fellowship, SSRC
Policy Analyst II, Work and Family, Niskanen Center
Early Childhood Policy Manager, Zero To Five Montana
Director of Marketing & Communications, Small Magic (Birmingham, AL)
Director of Institutional Partnerships, Small Magic (Birmingham, AL)
The Authors
Allison Muhlendorf manages external affairs for NIEER, including communications, earned and owned media, government relations, partnerships, and outreach. Allison and her team at Longleaf Strategies are conducting a communications audit for NIEER and developing a long-term external affairs strategy.
About NIEER
The National Institute for Early Education Research (NIEER) at the Graduate School of Education, Rutgers University, New Brunswick, NJ, conducts and disseminates independent research and analysis to inform early childhood education policy.
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