Alex Cohen is the Director of Learning and Evaluation for the Richard M. Fairbanks Foundation. Early childhood investments like state-funded Pre-K targeting low-income students have received a lot of attention in Indiana lately. At the same time, state and local leaders continue to grapple with how to improve test scores and graduation rates in K-12 schools. Some have questioned the benefits of investing in Pre-K. These people wonder: Won’t the impacts of early childhood investments be diminished if students enter a K-12 system that has problems, too? Aren’t we better off focusing state dollars on strengthening K-12 schools? Others have raised an alternate perspective: Won’t investments in K-12 have limited […]

As a state and as a country, we should focus on identifying and quantifying root causes of poor reading outcomes and be transparent about what the data reveal.