Attendance in a high quality early child care programs has been found to have long-term effects, lasting through adolescence. In his review of 36 model demonstrations of large-scale public programs, Barnett (1995) looked at long-term effects of participation in early childhood programs. Characteristics of the study samples varied by study and in many of the studies, the majority of participants were African American and/or were economically or academically disadvantaged. Children in the Perry Preschool program, for example, had low IQ scores (usually below 85). The average level of education of the mothers in these studies was low, with averages below 12 years in all of the studies and below 10 years in five of the studies. Most students in the control group began their schooling in Kindergarten, however, in the later studies, when options for preschool were more available, many students in the control or comparison groups could have attended preschool or early child care in some form. The findings suggest that participation in an early childhood program is related to higher levels of school achievement, lower levels of grade retention, and lower levels of placement in special education into the adolescent years. The strongest evidence of positive effects was found among the most rigorous experimental studies, those without high attrition rates, such as the Carolina Abecedarian, the Early Training Project, and the High/Scope Perry Preschool Project. Children's participation in the Carolina Abecedarian program was related to higher scores on achievement tests and fewer placements into special education grade (Campbell & Ramey, 1994; Campbell, Pungello, Miller-Johnson, Burchinal, & Ramey, 2001; Ramey, Campbell, Burchinal, Skinner, Gardner, & Ramey, 2000). Likewise, the High/ Scope Perry Preschool increased children's grades and test scores through 12th (Schweinhart, Barnes, & Weikart, 1993). This program also increased high school graduation rates, though it did not affect special education placement. Further, children who attended the Early Training Project experienced lower rates of placement into special education through adolescence, although there was no difference in achievement test scores between children in the program and control groups into adolescence (Gray, Ramsey, and Klaus, 1982).