It would take a relatively modest sum to make a big impact on early literacy efforts Gordon MacInnes Where does New Jersey lead the nation on things that count? We know that NJ Transit isn’t the model commuter rail system and that Rutgers doesn’t rank with Michigan, UT Austin or UC Berkeley, the best public universities, and that our tax burdens are not the envy of a single state. Here’s where we’re the national leader: New Jersey provides the highest-quality pre-K for kids from poor families. And this is a product not of gubernatorial or legislative actions but of the New Jersey Supreme Court’s decisions in the decades-long Abbott v. Burke case.