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Another example of an article that produced the similar results was written by Durlak (2002), which states that "the practical importance of the consistent, positive, long-term effects of early childhood programs are large enough and persistent enough to make a meaningful difference in the lives of children from low-income families"" (p. 38). The results from both these articles evidently show that high quality preschool has significant long-term positive effects on children's lives. In conclusion, without little or no access to high quality preschool programs, children from lower-socioeconomic backgrounds would fall behind academically and economically from their affluent peers until their adulthood. .
Furthermore, these children who receive low quality preschool education will lack the prerequisites to succeed in formal schooling. Early childhood is a crucial time period for the development of children's mental functions. This development "including the emergence of the abilities and skills in areas such as language, social, and cognitive "is now known to be greatly influenced by early childhood education" (Bowman, Donovan and Burns, 2001). Some of these skills include writing, letter recognition, number recognition, and counting. In short, children with little or no preschool participation would not have skills that are essential to succeed in kindergarten. Further consequences for children who belong to preschools in lower-socioeconomic communities include fewer resources, less qualified teachers, and more difficulties in addressing their individual needs to succeed academically. On the other hand, children from higher socioeconomic backgrounds are able to afford high quality preschools, which will give them the opportunity to learn all the abilities and skills to perform well academically in later years. As a result, an academic achievement gap is created between students from different socioeconomic statuses beginning in their preschool years.