Policymakers haven't paid attention to troubling racial and economic disparities in preschool, leading to a segregated system where low-income and minority children are often attending low-quality and non-diverse early-childhood programs, according to a new report from researchers at Teachers College, Columbia University, in New York.
A Better Start: Why Classroom Diversity in Preschool Matters says that access to preschool has increased, and that the population of children attending preschool has become more diverse. But that diversity in the child population overall has not translated into diversity in individual preschool classrooms, the study asserts. The 
report's main authors were Jeanne L. Reid and Sharon Lynn Kagan, both of whom are with the National Center for Children and Families at Teachers College. It was supported by the Century Foundation, a progressive think tank in Washington, and thePoverty and Race Research Action Council, a civil rights organization also in Washington.
Specifically, the researchers found:
- Children from low-income families and Hispanic children are less likely than children from higher-income families and non-Hispanic families to be enrolled in center-based early-childhood programs.
- Children from low-income families are more likely to attend low-quality preschool programs.
- Most children in public preschool programs attend economically segregated programs that are often effectively segregated by race and ethnicity.
