Parents of children in LAUP classrooms can feel confident that their 4-year-old is in a program that has been evaluated for quality. LAUP carefully reviews teacher qualfications, class sizes and adult/child ratios, and the environment in which our children explore and learn. All LAUP programs welcome parents into the classroom as active and engaged partners in their child's preschool experience

Setting High Standards for Preschool

In this first year, LAUP has evaluated preschool classrooms using a 5-Star Quality Assessment and Improvement Scale that takes into account key indicators of quality, including:

• Teacher qualifications;
• Class size and adult/child ratios;
• Quality of the learning and developmental environment; and
• Level of parent engagement in the program

Classrooms are assessed by experienced evaluators who review documents, interview parents of current students, and spend hours in the classroom observing the teachers and children together. Click here to download LAUP's 5-Star Quality Assessment and Improvement Scale, or call us for a copy at 866-581-LAUP.

Only 3-, 4- and 5-Star providers are eligible for direct funding from LAUP. Funding is based in part on each individual classroom's Star Quality Rating.

Helping Preschools Meet Those Standards

A big part of LAUP's mission is to work with preschools to help them improve the quality of their programs. LAUP Quality Support Coaches, highly qualified early childhood professionals with experience in the field, work directly in the classroom with teachers to offer support and guidance on best practices. These coaches are working with both contracted providers and with those providers who fall short of achieving a 3-Star Quality rating.

While both centers and home-based Family Child Care providers (FCC's) are held to the same high quality standards, the scale used to assess FCC's differs slightly from the scale for centers to reflect the different nature of the home environment.