(America heads to the polls today. Be sure to vote!)

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In red or blue states, early childhood education is popular across the country.

That’s what the First Five Years Fund (FFYF) has found after analyzing years of its own and other organization’s national polling data.

“Our analysis of this aggregate survey data found that national polling over the last decade shows quality early childhood education is a top priority issue for Americans of every political persuasion,” FFYF explains.

Every year, there has been “a consistent and growing desire among Americans across the political spectrum” for more investments and innovation in early childhood programs, especially for children from low-income families, FFYF’s report, “Early Childhood Education: The Public is Ready for Action,” explains.

This analysis creates “an evidence-based vision of where Americans stand on investing in high-quality ECE, and where policymakers can make stronger connections with their constituents’ priorities. This arsenal of individual polls paints an even brighter picture when studied together as a collective body of research.”

Among the report’s key findings:

• “Americans believe that early education begins at birth.”

• “Early childhood education is consistently ranked as one of the top priorities for Americans.”

• “Parents want early childhood education to help them raise well-rounded, capable individuals who contribute to society.”

• “Early childhood education supplements family life; it doesn’t replace it.”

• “Americans are willing to pay for public investment in high-quality early childhood education,” and

• “Candidates for office benefit politically from supporting increased investment in early childhood education.”

In addition to FFYF, the other data sources include:

• the Children’s Leadership Council

• Gallup

• the National Association for the Education of Young Children, and

• the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation

Given so many years of public support for early education and care programs, now is a great time for action. As the report says:

“Early learning is a truly unique opportunity-issue for policymakers today—particularly given the extreme partisanship dominating the political arena—because Americans see it as the starting point for enabling individual opportunity and achievement that build the society all Americans want. And the polling backs that up.”