OEC is currently studying the feasibility of a Pay For Success (PFS) approach to sustain financing for expansion. The foundation of this feasibility study is a rigorous evaluation of the impact of the UPK program on children’s social and academic outcomes in the elementary school years. The results of this evaluation will provide the needed evidence to demonstrate the value of investing in the UPK program. In addition to the PFS feasibility study, other options for sustaining funding of UPK are being explored. The funding commitments for the UPK expansion expire in 2020, so the immediate priority is identifying funding to sustain that expansion. OEC is also examining what resources would be  required to expand UPK to serve all eligible children in Cuyahoga County.

OEC continues to focus on the PFS feasibility study to identify sustainable funding for its UPK program. In 2018, an evaluation of child outcomes in kindergarten was completed. Specifically, the analysis compared children in UPK to children in other preschool settings (high-quality and low-quality) on two dimensions of kindergarten readiness: whether they were on-track for language & literacy, and their score on the social foundations for development assessment. The OEC found that children in UPK programs had better outcomes than the comparison groups. These results supported the development of benchmarks for a PFS project for UPK. A second supplemental analysis on attendance as a predictor of kindergarten readiness and on children’s social-emotional development is scheduled to be completed in the first half of 2019. Remaining work on the Cuyahoga County Childhood Education Expansion and Sustainability Plan will be focused on exploring and identifying who the funding source, or outcome payer, would be in a future PFS program (e.g., the County, school districts). With Cleveland identified as a Say Yes community the OEC is better equipped to finish discussions about end payers and funders in the first half of 2019.