Research Library
Policy Brief: Closing Achievement Gaps
Author: Haskins, R., Rouse, C.
Publication Date: 2005, Spring
Summary or Abstract: This Future of Children policy brief focuses on how the achievement gap exists prior to preschool and identifies differences in socio-economic background, parenting, brain development, and health as factors that contribute to racial and ethnic disparities in school readiness. The paper identifies two types of programs that seem most promising—those that help parents learn the behaviors that promote child development and school readiness and those that directly teach poor and low-income children school readiness skills, both intellectual and behavioral. Recommendations directed towards the federal government are offered.