President Biden will unveil another ambitious program on Wednesday when he addresses a joint session of Congress. The $2.8 trillion American Families Plan aims to expand access to education, including two years of free community college and universal pre-K for all 3 and 4-year-olds.

Here & Now‘s Peter O’Dowd speaks with W. Steven Barnett, co-director and founder of the National Institute for Early Education Research at Rutgers University, about how well universal pre-k works to close achievement gaps and improve educational outcomes.

This article was originally published on WBUR.org.

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