CHAPEL HILL - A detailed new six-county study of Smart Start -- the state's program designed to ensure that all North Carolina children arrive at school healthy and ready to learn -- has found the program helps boost children's thinking and language skills when compared with those of children not connected with the effort.
Researchers say they found statistically significant and meaningful improvements in Smart Start children's preparedness.
"For example, 17 percent of children not attending Smart Start centers had low cognitive skills, but only 9 percent of children who attended Smart Start centers had low skills," said study director Dr. Donna Bryant, a researcher at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill's Frank Porter Graham Child Development Center. "On the behavior measure, 18 percent of children not attending Smart Start centers had behavior problems whereas only 10 percent of Smart Start children did."
Those results were found for children who attended centers that received Smart Start assistance that was directly related to classroom quality. Not all Smart Start activities improved children's school readiness, however, even if they were useful for other reasons such as CPR training, the study showed.
The independent, state-funded UNC-CH analysis involved gathering information about the thinking, language and social skills of 508 kindergartners last fall. Of those children, 294 attended day-care centers participating in only a few or no Smart Start quality improvement efforts and were termed "comparison" children, Bryant said. Of the 214 Smart Start preschoolers, 142 attended centers that received Smart Start help directly related to quality improvement, and 72 attended centers that received other supportive types of technical assistance.
When all 214 Smart Start children were evaluated against comparison youngsters, the two groups did not differ, Bryant said. However, the Smart Start "direct" subgroup did show various skills superior to the comparison group. "The results of this multi-county study support earlier single-county studies of the positive effects of Smart Start on North Carolina children," Bryant said.
"They also suggest that Smart Start efforts need to be directly related to improving the quality of child care if they are to have an effect on children's school entry skills.
"In the interest of being comprehensive, local Smart Start partnerships may distribute multiple, diverse services to the child-care community," said Kelly Maxwell, co-director of the study and an FPG researcher. "This approach may not produce the intended improvements in child-care quality or child outcomes. To affect school entry skills, the type -- not just quantity - of Smart Start support is important."
While well-intended, special library programs, art projects, playground safety reviews and other forms of technical support had little influence on children's preparedness, Bryant said.
"This is not to say that such support is unimportant, but if the goals are to improve children's skills when they enter kindergarten, then the study tells us that certain types of help for child-care centers seem better than other types of help," she said.
Previous UNC-CH studies have shown that the quality of child care in North Carolina is gradually improving, that more N.C. children are enrolled in higher-quality child-care programs and that interagency collaboration has improved, she said.
"We are really pleased with these results," said Stephanie Fanjul, director of the Division of Child Development of the N.C. Department of Health and Human Services. "We're excited to have another evaluation report that proves what we see daily in the child-care centers across the state - that things are getting better for children because of Smart Start."
Karen Ponder, executive director of the N.C. Partnership for Children, which administers the program, agreed. "This study confirms that Smart Start works," Ponder said. "It will be very beneficial in helping local communities decide how to target their Smart Start funds to improve child-care quality."
North Carolina will spend about $350 per child this year on Smart Start, as compared to more than $5,000 per year on school children, Bryant said. Following up on this latest study, the Frank Porter Graham-UNC Smart Start Evaluation Team soon will begin a more detailed study to determine more specifically which types of assistance to child-care centers result in higher quality.
Note: Bryant can be reached at (919) 966-4523 (w) or 929-2615 (h).
Frank Porter Graham Contact: Loyd Little, 966-0867.
News Services Contact: David Williamson, 962-8596.