NASHVILLE — Children who attended Tennessee’s state-funded pre-kindergarten program before going to kindergarten did better academically over their kindergarten peers, but those higher achievements appeared to putter out by second grade, a new report says.

The state Comptroller office report, “Assessing the Effectiveness of Tennessee’s Pre-Kindergarten Program: Annual Report 2008-2009,” was intended to provide a closer look than previous examinations of the impact of pre-k on student performance in grades K-5. But the results largely were the same.

“After extensive review of the data and additional exploration of the results, we find the same persistent pattern of results,” the report concluded. “Pre-K participation is associated with a small but reliable effect on student outcomes in Kindergarten, specifically among economically disadvantaged students. These effects are detectable (but diminished) in First Grade and by Second Grade the difference between Pre-K students and a reasonably comparable group of non-Pre-K students is negligible.”

The report is part of a multi-year project produced by the Strategic Research Group under contract with the Tennessee Comptroller of the Treasury’s Offices of Research and Education Accountability.

In a news release, office director Phil Doss said “this analysis ... reveals that students participating in the Pre-K program demonstrated an increase in school readiness, such as language and math skills, which confirms that this objective of the state’s Pre-K program is being met.”

For complete details, see tomorrow’s Chattanooga Times Free Press.