Success with Small Bets

One of the key kindergarten readiness strategies that emerged from the Ready for Kindergarten (R4K) Collaborative was Transition to Kindergarten.  This strategy has focused on creating an effective transition for children entering kindergarten (particularly those who have received little or no prior formalized childcare or preschool) and to help prepare families and schools for kindergartners. One of the activities within the framework that is especially helpful with children who have had little or no access to formalized preschool or daycare (estimated at 60% in the Multnomah County) is the Early Kindergarten Transition (EKT) program.  This program helps children and families adapt to the new and often scary or traumatic school environment in order to experience success rather than failure in their earliest days of school.  EKT was not new to SVP since we took the calculated risk to invest in its launch in 2012 when it was in only three schools.  It has since grown to 34 schools, including seven of the eight demonstrations site schools.

A Portland State University doctoral candidate and current SUN intern, Rita Yelverton, has been working on a project comparing EKT children's kindergarten chronic absence rates to their counterparts with and without pre-k experience. EKT students not only had kindergarten attendance rates that were on par with students who did have preschool experience, but they were also 33% more likely to attend kindergarten consistently compared to children without any preschool experience.