Mississippi First Releases 2021 State of Pre-K Series Brief 4: Access to Pre-K, 2017-2018
This is the fourth and final brief in the State of Pre-K Series. The 2021 pre-K briefs as a whole provide strong evidence that the collaborative program is the path to expanding quality pre-K statewide.
Today, we are releasing the fourth and final brief of the series. The fourth brief provides pre-K access data on the state, county, and district levels.
In this brief, we calculate pre-K access rates for the state, each county, and each school district. We report two different rates:
- 2017-2018 pre-K access for four-year-olds across all provider types by state and county and
- 2017-2018 public pre-K access for 2018-2019 entering public school kindergarteners.
The 2017-2018 statewide pre-K access rate for four-year-olds across all providers was 67.29%. This rate represents the total percentage of four-year-old children served statewide when combining enrollments across provider types (public school districts, blended Head Start, Head Start, and licensed childcare), including providers participating in the Early Learning Collaboratives. We found that pre-K access for four-year-olds across all provider types shrank slightly since 2014-2015, from 69.55% to 67.29%.
In 2017-2018, both pre-K seats and the population of four-year-olds decreased, which is why overall declines in access were small. Although this is the first decline in seats we have seen since the inception of our report, the decline in population is a long-term trend. We believe the two most important strategies Mississippi can take to prevent a loss of quality and a loss of seats in our pre-K system during an era of population decline are increasing the number of early learning collaboratives and increasing the number of blended Head Start seats.
“Access to pre-K in Mississippi is essential, but access without quality will not serve the future of Mississippi,” said Micayla Tatum, Associate Director of Early Childhood Policy.
Executive Director Rachel Canter added, “Child outcome data clearly shows the difference that early learning collaboratives are making in the lives of children and families. We also see that communities with collaboratives stabilize and strengthen pre-K for every child, regardless of provider. As we continue to invest state dollars in pre-K, we must continue to support the collaborative pre-K program and ensure we keep quality as our north star.”
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