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How Do Caregivers Select Preschools? A Study of Children With and Without Disabilities

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Abstract

Background

Little is known about how parents and other caregivers conceptualize preschool quality, or what factors they prioritize when selecting a preschool. Caregivers of children with disabilities have the additional challenge of finding a preschool that can address their children’s special needs.

Objective

We explored the factors caregivers valued when selecting a preschool for their children, how these factors categorized into structural, process, and familial quality, and how caregiver characteristics related to preschool selection factors. We also compared caregivers’ preschool selection factors with the observed quality of their children’s preschool classroom.

Methods

In this study, 407 caregivers with children in 54 early childhood special education classrooms completed surveys regarding how they selected their children’s preschool. Classroom quality was assessed for each classroom, and compared to caregivers’ preschool selection factors.

Results

Findings showed that caregivers prioritized interpersonal teacher characteristics and safety when selecting preschools. Caregivers’ felt that process elements of quality were more important than structural or familial elements of quality. Caregivers whose child had a disability were more likely to prioritize structural elements of quality than caregivers whose child did not have a disability. No relationship was found between caregivers’ preschool selection factors and the quality of the classrooms in which their children were enrolled.

Conclusion

These findings provide insight for those wishing to make preschool programs more amenable to the needs of caregivers, particularly those of children with disabilities. Understanding caregivers’ preschool selection factors also deepens the theoretical understanding of preschool quality.

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Notes

  1. The early childhood special education (ECSE) programs attended by children in the present study are all referred to as preschools, therefore preschool is the term used here. Research on child care is included in the literature review as preschool and child care share many relevant characteristics. Many organizations (e.g., National Association for the Education of Young Children [NAEYC] 1983, rev. 1997) and researchers (Bassok et al. 2008; Fuller and Liang 1996; Hirshberg et al. 2005; Kisker et al. 1991) do not distinguish between preschool and child care. Particularly relevant to this study, caregivers (i.e., parents and others with primary responsibility of children) also refer to child care and preschool interchangeably (Martinez-Beck and Goerge 2009). The background studies referenced here use the term employed by that particular study. Otherwise, preschool is used.

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Acknowledgments

Funding for the larger research project through which the present study is possible was provided by the U.S. Department of Education, Grant R324A080037. The content of this publication does not necessarily reflect the views or policies of the US Department of Education. The authors wish to thank the teachers, families, and researchers involved this and the larger study.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Education, Ohio Wesleyan University, Phillips Hall – Room 214D, 61 S. Sandusky Street, Delaware, OH, 43085, USA

    Katherine Glenn-Applegate

  2. Department of Teaching and Learning, The Ohio State University, Columbus, OH, USA

    Laura M. Justice

  3. Department of Early Childhood, Physical, and Special Education, University of Toledo, Toledo, OH, USA

    Joan Kaderavek

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  1. Katherine Glenn-Applegate
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  2. Laura M. Justice
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  3. Joan Kaderavek
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Correspondence to Katherine Glenn-Applegate.

Additional information

This study was originally completed as part of the lead author’s dissertation research, Caregivers’ Preschool Selection Factors and Their Degree of Agency in Selecting High Quality Preschools (Glenn-Applegate 2011).

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Glenn-Applegate, K., Justice, L.M. & Kaderavek, J. How Do Caregivers Select Preschools? A Study of Children With and Without Disabilities. Child Youth Care Forum 45, 123–153 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10566-015-9322-1

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