Wichita State evaluation: Early childhood block grant serves about 7,200 children; positive-parenting at 10-year high

Dr. Lynn Sherperman, senior research scientist with Wichita State University’s Center for Applied Research and Evaluation, presented the latest external evaluation of the state’s Early Childhood Block Grant on behalf of the Cabinet.

"There were 25 grantees that served a little over 7,000 children in 69 counties this year," Sherperman said, summarizing coverage and reach. She told the Cabinet that 65% of the children served qualified for free or reduced-price lunch and that 51% showed some indicator of developmental delay. Classroom and developmental outcomes also improved: 72% of classrooms met the high-quality benchmark and 68–79% of four-year-olds were on track in key language and numeracy subtests.

Sherperman framed the findings around three domains: healthy development, strong families and early learning. She highlighted that the positive-parenting measure reached its highest level in a decade: "positive parenting continues to be at the highest rate it has been in 10 years," she said, noting observers use the Keys to Interactive Parenting tool and that training is available online for grantees.

Cabinet members pressed on methods and reach. Justice Melissa Standridge asked whether the evaluation captured children who had contact with the child welfare system; Sherperman said approximately 4% of served children were in out-of-home placement and that grantees recruit participants through referrals, schools and community outreach. The presenter emphasized that measures were selected for reliability, validity and sensitivity to change and that grantee-level reports are shared to support continuous quality improvement.

The Cabinet received the report and discussed implications for primary-prevention programming, family-resource coordination and follow-up site visits.