Why Hispanic Children Lag Behind

The National Task Force on Early Childhood Education for Hispanics (www.ecehispanic.org) urges that Hispanic children be enrolled in high quality education programs as early as possible in order to make more rapid progress in closing the Hispanic-White achievement gap. Hispanic children, especially those from disadvantaged circumstances, continue to lag behind non-Hispanic Whites on measures of school readiness and school achievement, including in reading and mathematics.

At the same time, there is growing evidence that large state-funded prekindergarten programs are producing valuable school readiness gains for Hispanic youngsters who have the opportunity to attend them. In addition, Head Start and high quality infant/toddler programs can contribute to greater school readiness. The earlier Hispanic children have access to high quality educational programs, the better. However, despite the benefits of greater access to such programs, Hispanic youngsters continue to be underrepresented among children who attend early childhood programs for several reasons. Among them are an inadequate supply of affordable preschool slots in many Hispanic communities, a lack of information for Hispanic parents on the programs that are available, and language barriers with program operators.

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