The effect of attending full‐day kindergarten on English learner students

Bibliographic Data

ID11684536
AuthorsJill S Cannon (0000-0002-9703-8325, Public Policy Institute of California, corresponding author), Alison Jacknowitz (American University), Gary Painter (0000-0002-2962-4904, University of Southern California)
Year2011
Volume30
Issue2
Pages287-309
Publication date2011-03-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueJournal of Policy Analysis and Management (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0276-8739 • E-ISSN: 1520-6688
PublisherWiley (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1002/pam.20560
OpenAlexW1893873812
LanguageEN
Citations received6
References cited19

A significant and growing English learner (EL) population attends public schools in the United States. Evidence suggests they are at a disadvantage when entering school and their achievement lags behind non‐EL students. Some educators have promoted full‐day kindergarten programs as especially helpful for EL students. We take advantage of the large EL population and variation in full‐day kindergarten implementation in the Los Angeles Unified School District to examine the impact of full‐day kindergarten on academic achievement, retention, and English language fluency using difference‐in‐differences models. We do not find signficant effects of full‐day kindergarten on most academic outcomes and English fluency through second grade. However, we find that EL students attending full‐day kindergarten were 5 percentage points less likely to be retained before second grade and there are differential effects for several outcomes by student and school characteristics. © 2011 by the Association for Public Policy Analysis and Management

Academic achievement · Differential (mechanical device · Differential effects · Disadvantage · Fluency · Mathematics education · Political science · Population · Sociology · Demography · Early Childhood Education and Development · Medicine · Parental Involvement in Education · Psychology · School Choice and Performance