Promoting Kindergarten Readiness in a High-Poverty Urban Context: Evidence for the Replicability of a Summer Pre-K Program

Building on prior pilot findings, this study examined whether a brief, manualized summer program, implemented by community teachers in a high-poverty city in the southern United States, would yield comparable gains in kindergarten readiness – supporting replication and scalability across cohorts. Four cohorts (N = 115; M age = 60.3 months; 49% female) completed a four-week (20-session) program. Children were assessed at program entry and exit on 12 tasks indexing language/literacy, math, and socioemotional skills; a subset completed an additional baseline assessment four weeks pre-program. Linear mixed-effects models estimated within-child change, showing moderate gains from pre- to posttest across all three readiness domains. No main effects of cohort nor time by cohort interactions emerged. An ordinal mixed-effects model comparing performance levels on a standardized literacy screener showed that children were over nine times more likely to be classified in a higher performance level at posttest compared to pretest. A four-week, teacher-led summer program yielded consistent, domain-general readiness gains in a high-poverty context, replicating earlier pilot findings and signaling efficacy of a freely-available manualized program to support children’s successful transition to kindergarten. Program features likely contributing to gains, including play-based academic instruction, emotionally supportive teacher-child interactions, and strengthened home-school connections, are discussed.