A study of variables related to student rates of retention, graduation and special education placement for four cohorts of Colorado Preschool Program (CPP) participants

The purpose of the current study was to examine the educational outcomes of four cohorts of children who participated in the Colorado Preschool Program (CPP) between 1988 and 1992. The students qualified for, and attended the state-funded compensatory preschool program. CPP espouses a three-fold premise that participation in quality preschool intervention programs will decrease numbers of students retained to repeat a grade, decrease rates of special education placement, and increase rates of high school graduation for children perceived to be at-risk for academic failure. The data used in the present study were retrieved from an existing data set that was collected as part of a larger Colorado Department of Education (CDE) study. Additional data were culled from a Colorado school district's database. Logistic regression analyses were used to analyze each of the aforementioned conditions with special education placement, grade retention, and high school graduation rates as independent variables. Gender, ethnicity, and primary language spoken in the home at the time of CPP participation were the criterion variables. The resulting analyses suggested that in light of limitations regarding both the methodology and covariate data set, it not possible to create a predictive model to determine whether the criterion variables had a significant impact on the educational outcomes of interest.