Michigan has hit new highs on pre-K enrollment, with more than 55,000 4-year-olds enrolled for the 2025-2026 school year, state officials announced at a press conference Thursday, May 21.
That’s around 7,000 more kids enrolled in the state’s Great Start for Readiness Program (GSRP) than last school year, representing the latest push toward Governor Gretchen Whitmer’s goal of reaching 75% of 4-year-olds enrolled in any state-funded pre-K program by 2027.
Why the fanfare?
Because the state wants kids in seats (figuratively – GSRP curriculum is play-based, so it doesn’t actually look like sitting at a desk all day). During her administration, Whitmer has made universal pre-K a tentpole policy, significantly expanding Michigan’s program in 2024 to eliminate income eligibility caps.
“When children start strong, they stay on track,” said Emily Laidlaw, deputy director at MiLEAP, the state’s early childhood education agency, at the press conference in Grand Rapids. “That’s what Pre-K for All is all about.”
MiLEAP spokesperson Aundreana Jones-Poole said the agency has not yet calculated what percentage of the 75% goal Michigan has reached with these new numbers.
In addition to stressing the years of research and evidence supporting the benefits of early childhood education – including pre-K’s long term impacts on healthy brain development and a child’s success in school and the workplace – state officials reiterated a few other key points aimed at Michigan parents:
Even as state officials celebrated the new numbers, it has still not achieved state enrollment goals. According to state data reviewed by the Free Press, GSRP enrollment is short of its target enrollment goal for the 2025-26 school year by roughly 3,000 kids and is on track to underspend around $36 million, even as it looks toward a 2027 state budget that will either maintain or continue to increase GSRP investment.
Why? Experts say there are many different factors that make actually getting a universal pre-K program off the ground challenging and more complicated in practice than in policy. Things largely out of the state’s control, like declining overall population, fewer kids, local demographics shifts post-pandemic can make it difficult for local school districts to know where kids are going to be and then build up enough GSRP slots to meet demand in any given area, education economist and founder of the National Institute for Early Education Research Steven Barnett previously told the Free Press.
This leads to situations some ISD leaders say they’ve found themselves in this school year: some areas across their school districts see empty GSRP seats and not enough kids enrolling while others see long waitlists to a GSRP spot. Ultimately, some ISD leaders say the state’s Pre-K for All slogan rings hollow in those areas where kids can’t get a GSRP spot because of high demand and not enough seats.
For parents interested in enrolling their kids in GSRP, visit miprekforall.org.
Beki San Martin is a fellow at the Detroit Free Press who covers childcare, early childhood education and other issues that affect the lives of children ages 5 and under and their families in metro Detroit and across Michigan. Contact her at rsanmartin@freepress.com.
This fellowship is supported by the Bainum Family Foundation. The Free Press retains editorial control of this work.
This article originally appeared on Detroit Free Press: State announces new pre-K for all enrollment numbers at record high
Reporting by Beki San Martin, Detroit Free Press / Detroit Free Press
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