Federal Reserve Bank
pushes Universal Preschool

By Julie M. Quist

If you get nervous when wealthy business interests want a say in what’s good for your kids, you’ll shudder at a guy from the Minneapolis Federal Reserve Bank who’s made himself a name internationally by promoting preschool as an economic investment.

His name is Art Rolnick, and he says he has that massive taxpayer funding of preschool will save us billions and keep our kids out of jail and off welfare. For every dollar we cough up, he claims, we will end up paying $17 less in programs on people who fail because they weren’t sent off to school at three. Does he really believes that lowering the school age to three and creating expensive new entitlements will make state and federal budgets solvent?

Rolnick’s research is flawed. That won’t stand in the way of his fame, though. The media, public agencies, universities, central planners, and business moguls love that message, so flawed data won’t end his rave reviews.

For example, the Perry Preschool Study, which followed 3- and 4-year-olds over a 40-year period, is central to his claims. It supposedly showed that children in “high quality” preschool were more successful in life.

But this study wasn’t about your average child, so the results aren’t valid for most children. The Perry Project studied children close to "retarded intellectual functioning" Applying  results of a study of severely disadvantaged children to most of our kids is misleading and unethical.

Other studies show different results, such as no improvement in later years in academic achievement, IQ, or social behavior. Another found no positive results of any preschool program, Most significantly, reliable studies have shown that many hours away from mom and dad frequently results in more serious acting up.

It stands to reason. Removing young children from their parents at an early age is not family friendly.

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