The Preschool Learning Development Program (PLD) in Long Valley, New Jersey, was designed to identify preschoolers with developmental handicaps and provide them with systematic, individualized, instructional intervention to enhance developmental rate prior to entry into public school. The PLD Program consisted of three components: candidate search, diagnostic screening and evaluation, and the individual educational prescription (IEP). A study was conducted to determine whether PLD Program participants exhibit higher developmental growth rates as measured by the PLD Inventory. It was found that slow developing and handicapped preschool children who are given a focused, systematic program designed on the PLD model show significantly greater growth rates than those expected of normally developing preschoolers not exposed to such programming. (SW)