A new study by the Yale University Child Study Center reveals that preschoolers are expelled at three times the rate of children in grades K-12.

Conducted for the New York City-based Foundation for Child Development and led by Yale researcher Walter S. Gilliam, the study, Prekindergartners Left Behind: Explusion Rates in State Prekindergarten Systems (13 pages, PDF), found that rates of expulsion varied widely among the states but still exceeded those in K-12 classes in all but three states. Expulsion rates were lowest in classrooms located in public schools and Head Start programs, and highest in faith-affiliated centers, for-profit child care, and other community-based settings.

According to the study, which was based on data collected for the National Prekindergarten Study from forty states that fund prekindergarten programs and from 4,815 preschool classrooms, four-year-olds were expelled at a rate about 1.5 times greater than three-year-olds, while boys were expelled at a rate more than 4.5 times that of girls. The study also found that African American children attending state-funded pre-K were about twice as likely to be expelled as Latino and white children, and more than five times as likely to be expelled as Asian-American children. In classrooms where the teacher had no access to a psychologist or psychiatrist, students were expelled about twice as frequently.

"Classroom-based behavioral consultation appears to be a promising method for reducing prekindergarten expulsion," said Gilliam. "When teachers reported having access to a behavioral consultant who was able to provide classroom-based strategies for dealing with challenging student behaviors, the likelihood of expulsion was nearly cut in half."

To read or download the full report, visit: http://www.ffcd.org/PDFs/NationalPreKExpulsionPaper03.02_new.pdf.