Original Research by School Decision on The Early Years
The Early Years is a prekindergarten program serving a small cohort of young children in Jacksonville, Illinois. As a public school offering only pre-K grades, it operates within Jacksonville SD 117 and sits outside the accountability and testing metrics that apply to K-12 schools.
Enrollment is modest, serving children in the early ages, with a student body that is predominantly white, followed by students identifying as two or more races, Black, and Hispanic. The school's demographic composition skews toward the majority population in the area, though it includes racial and ethnic diversity. Data on free-or-reduced-price-lunch eligibility and special populations were not reported, which is common for early-childhood programs where eligibility determination and services operate differently than in older grades.
Jacksonville itself is a small county-seat city in west-central Illinois, about a short drive from Springfield. The community has a historic downtown anchored by Central Park and the public square, ringed by residential neighborhoods containing architecturally significant homes. Civic life centers on downtown institutions including the Morgan County Courthouse and a Carnegie-built public library. The city is also home to several educational institutions, including Illinois College and the Illinois School for the Deaf and Illinois School for the Visually Impaired, which operate separate campuses. Major employers include Jacksonville Memorial Hospital (the largest employer), several manufacturers including Reynolds Consumer Products and Nestle USA, and the college and state institutional sector.
Housing in Jacksonville is relatively affordable relative to state and national benchmarks. The area has seen incremental downtown revitalization through a tax-increment-financing district and Jacksonville Main Street programming rather than rapid population growth. The housing stock ranges from Civil War and turn-of-the-century homes to new construction. Homeownership is accessible, though mortgage rates have remained in a moderate range.
The parent district, Jacksonville SD 117, has undertaken a substantial facilities program over recent years, with renovations and upgrades across several school buildings funded through bond sales tied to sales-tax revenue and federal pandemic relief funds, completed without raising property taxes. The district is also moving forward with construction of a new Murrayville-Woodson elementary school, expected to be completed by fall 2027, which will add kindergarten capacity district-wide. In late 2024, the district approved a modest increase to its annual tax levy along with bond authorization, decisions tied to ongoing capital needs.
Since The Early Years serves only pre-K, no state assessment results, graduation rates, or attendance data are available. For families exploring early-childhood options in Jacksonville, the school functions as a pre-K entry point within a district managing significant building improvements and growth planning in its elementary offerings.
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