For over 60 years, Head Start has been identified as a high-quality early childhood program, designed to deliver services “for the well-being of children in low-income families based on evidence that they were less likely to succeed in school than their more well-positioned peers. As its name implies, the Head Start program was developed to enhance the experiences of children in low-income families prior to school entry, with the goal of alleviating the negative effects of growing up in poverty,” according to the current law.
As Arizona’s early childhood agency, First Things First is uniquely positioned to provide public comment to the Office of Head Start, Administration for Children and Families, Department of Health and Human Services on the Notice of Proposed Rulemaking for Head Start.
The recent proposed federal changes would essentially eliminate more than 1,400 enhanced experience requirements in favor of state and local regulations. These changes would fundamentally lower Head Start’s quality and significantly erode the difference between the high-quality experiences children enrolled in Head Start currently receive and those enrolled in child care programs that meet basic state licensing requirements.
Arizona Head Start programs currently serve over 17,000 children and employ more than 5,000 employees. Of those children, over 1,000 are from families experiencing homelessness, over 1,700 are infants and toddlers receiving intervention services for developmental delays and over 500 children are in foster care.
In the name of flexibility, the proposed policy abandons current Head Start standards and practices that evidence shows make a difference for children in need, in favor of meeting minimum licensing requirements. For example, under the proposed changes, Head Start programs could choose to lessen support for children with disabilities, remove requirements to provide home visits, eliminate low child-to-teacher ratios and classroom sizes and allow significant cutbacks in hours of operation. There are many more.
These are some fundamental examples of the support Head Start programs provide to families, supporting children’s learning, school readiness, health and development before they enter kindergarten.
The official Head Start website identifies 4 areas of focus for Head Start programs: early learning and development, health and wellness, family well-being and family engagement. First Things First believes the proposed rule would eliminate most of the health and wellness and family well-being areas. That leaves little that distinguishes Head Start programs from child care centers operating at minimum licensing-level standards.
For these and countless similar reasons, First Things First recommends maintaining many of the current rules, which set a higher minimum standard than most state and local licensing requirements. Maintaining the current Head Start rule allows qualifying children and families served by Head Start programs to continue to receive the extra support they need to be ready for kindergarten and beyond.
Melinda Morrison Gulick is the Chief Executive Officer of First Things First.
