Three learning communities will implement the Kansas Preschool Program (KPP).  Coffeyville, Liberal, and Rossville, communities respectively located in southeast, southwest and northeast Kansas, are the KPP learning sites.  These three distinct communities will demonstrate how the KPP model can be successfully implemented through integration and collaboration.

Community Characteristics

Initial Status of the Kansas Learning Communities

Each demonstration community has its own needs and desires to enhance and expand its preschool programs.  Click below on a community to learn more about its background, partners, and project goal:

• Coffeyville
• Liberal
• Rossville

Needs Justification for Chosen Approach

All three communities are ready for and committed to building high quality integrated preschool programs which meet KPP standards. They also represent geographic diversity across the state.  In addition, they all have challenges and needs to be met:

• Their three Head Start programs are not grantees of school districts, allowing the project to address the unique challenges posed when early learning programs are governed by different organizations.

• While each community is providing some preschool services, they have significant unmet needs in terms of availability (unmet demand), quality (Four-Year-Old Programs do not yet meet all 10 NIEER standards) and inclusion.

The vision of this project is to create integrated preschool programs which meld the currently fragmented services. The result will be seamless services where children are natural peers, unaware of programmatic differences, but receiving high-quality, evidence-based services that prepare them to enter kindergarten ready to learn.