Associations between Public Preschool Attendance and Third Grade School Outcomes: Are There Lasting Benefits in a Post-COVID Environment?

Using newly-available data from Tulsa, OK – home of a renowned and much-studied universal public preschool program – we investigated associations between public preschool attendance and a wide range of third-grade school administrative outcomes collected in the post-COVID era. We explored associations between preschool attendance and school outcomes in our full sample of students (all of whom are from low-income households), as well as in our sizable subsample of dual language learners (DLLs). Public preschool was unrelated to state standardized test scores, grade retention, and special education status. However, for DLLs only, public preschool attendance predicted substantial reductions in third-grade (post-COVID) absenteeism. Given skyrocketing rates of absenteeism after schools re-opened post-COVID – rates that are especially large for students from low-income and minoritized backgrounds like those in our sample – these results hold special importance and may suggest a potentially overlooked response to a rising problem.