Obama's Preschool Proposal Faces Rocky Road

It's an expensive scheme that promises little in the way of benefits

President Barack Obama's proposal to significantly expand preschool programs could run into roadblocks as Republican lawmakers and others question the effectiveness of existing early-learning programs. …

Lindsey Burke, a fellow in education policy at the conservative Heritage Foundation, called Head Start a failure and said she isn't "optimistic that any federal expansion of preschool will look any different from this failed program." She pointed to a recent report from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, which oversees Head Start, showing that children in the program made more academic progress than their counterparts who weren't enrolled, but those gains faded by third grade. The study also found parents of Head Start children reported their children had less aggressive behavior and better social skills.

The Obama administration, which has acknowledged the shortcomings of Head Start, has tried to boost the caliber of the program by tagging more than 250 programs as deficient and forcing them to compete for funds.