Center for the Study of Childcare Employment

Since 1999, New Jersey’s court-ordered Abbott Preschool Program has provided publicly funded early education services in a combination of private child care centers, Head Start centers, and public schools, and it has sought to place preschool teachers on an equal footing with K-12 teachers in terms of pay and qualifications. We interviewed 98 private child care and Head Start directors in 2007 to collect their firsthand accounts of implementing this ambitious educational reform, and their suggestions for improving it.