Invest Early: 15 Years of Impacts. Evaluation Results

With support from the Blandin Foundation, Invest Early is a comprehensive early childhood collaborative in Itasca County, Minnesota, that serves young children and their families with risk factors that may impede school success. The core services consist of early childhood education, parent education, health services, and extended-day child care, as well as a variety of support services based on their need or interest, including family development, home visits, mental health support, and transportation. When Invest Early started, leaders partnered with Wilder Research to develop and implement a longitudinal evaluation plan that tracked a comparison group of students who entered Itasca County schools in the year prior to Invest Early's inaugural year. Data were collected on both the comparison group and the Invest Early students at various intervals over time for 13 years. This year, however, the Leadership Team determined they were also interested in learning more about: (1) the demographic, social, and economic trends in Itasca County since Invest Early's inception; (2) the state of early childhood programming nationally; and (3) what makes Invest Early successful, and what improvements are needed. As such, in 2019, Wilder Research conducted the following research activities to supplement the quantitative evaluation data collected annually: (1) a literature review of current research and trends in the early childhood field; (2) a review of indicators of child and family characteristics and well-being, primarily Census data, for Itasca County over the last 15 years; (3) qualitative interviews with a selected group of 22 current and former Invest Early parents; (4) an analysis of key evaluation data points from Invest Early from the last five years; and (5) a facilitated discussion with 38 community partners on the ripple impacts of Invest Early on the community. [This report was prepared for Itasca Area Schools Collaborative. For "Invest Early: Early Childhood Initiative. Year 12 Evaluation Summary," see ED612479.]