Poverty and pre-school enrollment levels on Long Island
1 in 3 LI children under 5 are enrolled in nursery/pre-school
Let’s explore the state of our pre-school enrollment on Long Island.
The first chart we will take a look at is the percentage of children under 5 who are enrolled in a nursery or pre-school.
Long Island compares favorably against New York as a whole. Generally speaking, children are more likely to be enrolled in nursery or pre-school, and that has stayed relatively stable from 2012 to 2017.
From here, we can dig a little deeper.
Broken out by poverty level, another picture arises – residents in poverty enroll their children in pre-school less.
More alarmingly, the rate for children in poverty has been trending downwards.
There is a large discrepancy between Nassau County and Suffolk County, and both counties have a lower than average enrollment rate for children in poverty compared to the state.
Data from American Community Survey 1 year 2012 – 2017