Last year, Minnesota lawmakers agreed to fund another 5,200 seats of free, voluntary pre-kindergarten. This $38 million funding boost for prekindergarten comes as some school districts struggle to close budget gaps, including Minneapolis Public Schools’ budget gap of $78 million. Lawmakers argued that the expansion will hopefully support the entire education system.
The expansion won’t impact every child in Minnesota. Minnesota does not have universal free pre-k. However, Minnesota does have three different programs that serve three and four year olds: School Readiness, Voluntary Prekindergarden, and Head Start. All three programs are designed to serve students that meet forms of at-risk criteria, such as being in foster care, qualifying for a free or reduced lunch, having a parent who is incarcerated, or being considered an English Learner.
In the 2023-2024 school year, 1 percent of Minnesota three year olds and 11 percent of Minnesota four year olds participated in a prekindergarten program. The National Institute for Early Education Research (NIEER) awarded Minnesota a 5.4/10 for meeting quality standards benchmarks.
The new funding raises the amount of potential seats from 7,868 to 12,360 — a 75 percent increase.
While lower income students (up to a gross annual income of $45,991) can attend public prekindergarten for free, many are already eligible for scholarships through Early Learning Scholarship funding, which provides $65.6 million in scholarships to eligible families to offset the cost of enrollment in early childhood programs earning a Three- or Four-Star Parent Aware Rating.
Families with higher incomes can choose to pay a fee to attend public prekindergarten. Payment is calculated based on a sliding scale. For example, if a child from an 8 person household whose household income was over $112, 544 per year wished to attend a public prekindergarten program in the Minneapolis Public School district, the charge would be $800 a month. Private daycare costs in the area often cost twice that figure or more. The cost difference might make a significant difference for families who are struggling to make ends meet.
Private child care operators expressed concern about how the expansion of this program might impact their livelihoods. A recent Minnesota Public Radio piece interviewed private child care providers to understand how their businesses will react to these new expanded programs, writing that
Ashley Egerdahl said she’s losing half of her preschool students to free or low-cost programs. “It’s like a double edged sword,” said Egerdahl, who oversees Pine Pals IL Childcare and Preschool in Bemidji. “I’m glad it’s an option, but it makes it harder for private companies like ours to stay afloat” in a “a market system that’s failing for child care centers.”
However, Minnesota’s public prekindergarten operates on a traditional full or half-day school schedule, making it a less desirable option for families who might need a robust childcare schedule. Families that are in need and face these scheduling issues can turn to alternate programs, like the Early Learning Scholarship.
While prekindergarten can solve childcare problems for families, the jury is still out on whether research shows clear academic and behavioral benefits. To date, there has only been one prekindergarten study to use a fully randomized control group. Vanderbilt University’s 2022 study followed 2,990 low-income children in Tennessee from prekindergarten to 6th grade, some of whom had won a state lottery to attend prekindergarten, and some who had not — and found that
At the end of their first year, the kids who went to pre-K scored higher on school readiness — as expected. But after third grade, they were doing worse than the control group. And at the end of sixth grade, they were doing even worse. They had lower test scores, were more likely to be in special education, and were more likely to get into trouble in school, including serious trouble like suspensions. “Whereas in third grade we saw negative effects on one of the three state achievement tests, in sixth grade we saw it on all three — math, science and reading,” says Farran. “In third grade, where we had seen effects on one type of suspension, which is minor violations, by sixth grade we’re seeing it on both types of suspensions, both major and minor.”
Other studies echo these findings: students who attend prekindergarten often lose their academic advantage by first grade, but exhibit increased behavioral problems. Dale Farran, co-author of the Vanderbilt study, hypothesized that three and four year olds are simply too young to be filling out worksheets, sitting quietly, and listening to teachers all day long, and this premature insertion causes eventual educational fatigue and behavioral rebellion. Farran advocated for hybrid or play-based prekindergarten, saying that the educational and behavioral outcomes for students might strongly exceed our expectations.
For many families, however, the discussion of the type of kindergarten pales in comparison to the genuine need for cost-effective childcare. Lawmakers understand the pressures for family-first educational policy. In Minnesota, federal and state funding for public prekindergarten shows every sign of advancing. For example, in 2024, Minnesota was awarded an annual $8 million 3-year federal renewal Preschool Development Grant B-5 (PDG B-5). Lawmakers seem committed to expanding access to both childcare and prekindergarten programs, a move that can help growing families amidst Minnesota’s nation-leading child care costs. The program is still small, as prekindergarten is expensive. Future state budget meetings will hopefully be able to rearrange funding in order to prioritize families.
As Minnesota moves its early child programs and policies towards the future, policymakers would do well to look towards New York’s mixed-delivery childcare system. This allows families to choose from community organizations that give play-based care, academic instruction, or a mix of the two — a unique solution for each unique child.
