Early childhood education: Key to life long success...

“The sooner the better” is the perfect tag line for early childhood education. There is no magic bullet to ensure a lifetime of self-fulfillment in personal and career terms. But rigorous research shows that high-quality early childhood education is an extraordinarily powerful means to promote continued success in school, in the workplace, and also in social and civic realms.

It may seem surprising, but the experiences of children in their early years have disproportionately large impacts relative to experiences during their school years and beyond. If children lag in those early years, chances are that they will never catch up. Remediation of deficiencies in learning of all types is far more difficult and expensive than learning early on. The good news is that high-quality programs focused on early childhood years can have powerful long-term impacts for all racial and economic groups across the country.

Research shows that high-quality early childhood programs lead to income gains of 1/3 to 3.5 percent each year when the children are adults. That may not seem like much. But compounded, the higher earnings account for between $9,000 and over $30,000 when the program costs are subtracted. Viewed nationwide, if all families were able to enroll their children in pre-school programs at the same rate as high-income families do now, the total enrollment nationwide would increase by around 13 percent and would yield a present value of at least $4.8 billion – some estimates approximate this number as high as $16.1 billion – from the lifetime earnings per person after deducting the costs of the program. High-quality early childhood education programs provide long-term benefits that far outweigh the costs.