The only other information I have is that a lot of these nurseries use tests (like "put the block in the right hole") as part of their admittance exams, and high performance those tests show absolutely no correlation with later success. (Obviously kids who do very poorly might have other issues) That's from NutureShock.
And finally, in New York City these "top" nursery schools are considered feeder schools to the "top" elementary schools, and so on, so regardless of whether the kids in them have been better educated, they might gain an admission advantage to private high schools and consequently university. See the movie "Nursery University." (That's not actually a recommendation, it was completely painful.)
High-quality nurturing can only be done by the parents (generally speaking).
All else is secondary.
1) The comment I replied to above is pretty accurate, especially for younger children. The parents and environment the child is in are the largest influence on their academic success. If the culture of the area is not about education and success in learning, you've got a long uphill battle.
Honestly, you could pump all the money in the world into the worst high school in the country and it won't make a lick of difference if the students don't want to learn. Upping the school's finances won't change the outcomes on the level people are looking for. To get those kinds of results you need to change the culture and community around education. However, if a school/community is simply lacking resources, then it could make a huge difference.
2) Sending your child to Pre-K DOES better prepare them for Kindergarten and school in general. How much a difference one could truly make over another is not something I've ever actually asked my wife. Dinner conversation for tonight :-). I would also love to see the paper araneae had read and run that by her as well.
Education wise Pre-K will help your child with basics - colors, shapes, letters and numbers. However, the biggest thing Pre-K will do is help your child learn to socialize and interact with people their own age in a classroom setting. This doesn't sound like much, but it is actually a big deal.
3) Something not often thought about is WHEN to send your child to Kindergarten. Many schools have policies like "If your child will be 5 years old by December 31st", which may give you a choice. It is NOT always best to send your child to Kindergarten as soon as they are eligible to attend. If your child is ready, by all means send them. But if they're truly not ready, sending them is really not going to help them.
Only if you believe them. Sure, everything gets harder as you get older, including the 'basics' (such as walking). But for some learning was never easy, always hard work. The difference age adds to that is just another hurdle to overcome.
The big trick is to never stop learning.
> Now, I certainly recognize that many aspects of the current education system are overblown. But you're going to have a difficult time convincing me preschool is as dispensable as college.
Attitude is the one thing that is in-dispensable when it comes to learning, all else - including age - can be overcome.
Friends of mine joined the accounting club at their university because it had the best hockey pool.
So they end up at the end of the year invited to some wine and cheese thing where the guys from KPMG, et al, are talent scouting. Being the accounting club they are hanging out with a bunch of wall flowers. Started chatting with the guys from KPMG and at the end of the event they all have job offers, so my friend finally says we'd love to accept but we're english majors, they say, don't worry, if you really need to learn accounting we'll pay you to go take it.
But on ranking preschools...? That seems to be a stretch. All you parents out there, feel free to correct me. But my vague recollection of preschool consists of running around a playground, finger painting, and a nap.
(Btw, I don't think such a list would exist as it really doesn't matter.)