Chester E. Finn, Jr. outlines the issues that define, animate, and complicate today''s contentious pre-kindergarten debate in American education. He examines such topics as: which children really need it; how many aren''t getting it; who should provide it and at what expense; what is the right balance between education and child care; and how to know whether it is succeeding.

Chester E. Finn Jr. is president of the Thomas B. Fordham Institute, senior editor of Education Next, senior fellow at the Hoover Institution at Stanford University, and chairman of Hoover's Task Force on K-12 Education.