Research project Attendance at preschool

In recent years, municipalities and school principals have observed a declining attendance of children enrolled in Swedish preschool (Skolinspektionen, 2023, SKR, 2024, SOU 2020:67).

The observations also indicate that attendance appears to be lowest in areas with low socio-economic composition (see also Fjällström, et al., 2023; O’Connor et al., 2020).   National statistics on attendance in preschool are lacking and in many cases an overview of attendance among school principals is also lacking. This can be considered problematic as regular attendance at preschool can be related to, among other things, increased chances of learning and development (Hall et al., 2013; Dietrichson et al., 2020), to full school attendance (Del Boca et al., 2023) and to reducing the risk of exclusion (OECD, 2020; Swedish Police Authority 2023;).

Scandinavian and Swedish research reviews (Albæk Nielsen & Nygård Christoffersen, 2009; Bjørnestad & Pramling Samuelsson, 2012; Persson, 2015) consistently point to beneficial and long-term effects of children being in stimulating learning environments in a high-quality preschool from an early age.