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January, 2001
U.S. General Accounting Office
Report to the Chairman
Subcommittee on Oversight of Government Management
Restructuring and the District of Columbia
Committee on Governmental Affairs
U.S. Senate
Washington, D.C.
Title I Preschool Education -
More Children Served, but Gauging Effect on School Readiness
Difficult
During the 1999-2000 school year, an estimated 17 percent of
the school districts that received title I funds spent an
estimated $407 million on preschool services, making title I
second only to Head Start in its level of federal preschool
education funding. The remaining 83 percent that did not use their
funds to support preschool education services cited, among other
things, a greater need to use title I funds for older children.
School districts used their funds to serve an estimated 313,000
preschool children equal to about 8 percent of the children who
will eventually enter kindergarten. Almost all of these children
were between the ages of 3 and 5, and they received a variety of
services funded with title I as well as other federal, state, and
local funding. Children were served in every state, with Texas
serving the largest number of children.
Currently, education lacks the information to measure title
one's
effect on children's school readiness, but it may be able to
structure its design of a planned title I preschool study to
collect such information. Recognizing that isolating title Is
effect from the effect of other funding that supports preschool
children may be difficult, we are recommending that Education, as
part of its planned title I preschool study, explore the
feasibility of isolating and measuring title Is effect on
school readiness. In commenting on our report, Education agreed
with our recommendation.
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