鈥淵ou know, Hector, you don鈥檛 have to eat it, but why don鈥檛 you just try it?鈥 urged Michele Gonzalez, an associate teacher in a Head Start classroom here on the campus of Valencia Elementary School, east of Los Angeles.
As the children nibbled on pear slices, Ms. Gonzalez got them to talk about the classroom materials they wanted to use during 鈥渨ork time.鈥 Some headed for the housekeeping area, others set up farm sets with plastic animals, and a few sat on the floor listening to songs about colors while they followed along in large books.
Meanwhile, in a back office, parents gathered for a monthly meeting after dropping off their children.
The nutritional, social, and educational needs of disadvantaged children鈥攃ombined with opportunities for parents to be involved鈥攈ave been elements of the Head Start program since it started more than 40 years ago as part of President Lyndon B. Johnson鈥檚 War on Poverty.
鈥淔or disadvantaged folks, the comprehensive services have always been the flagship鈥 of the federal child-development program, said Channel Wilkins, the director of the Office of Head Start, part of the federal government鈥檚 Administration for Children and Families.
But as federal debate over reauthorization of the program drags on for a fourth year, Head Start finds itself coping with pressures that its founders might not have anticipated.
In some locations around the country, Head Start grantees that have served communities for decades have been forced to promote their services or risk losing children to state-funded programs that have become increasingly popular.
Supporters of Head Start, which has a budget of about $6.8 billion for the current fiscal year, also say they have had to endure flat funding in recent years.
The program鈥檚 adaptability is evident here at the Valencia site, which is run by Options, a private, nonprofit child-care and human-services agency based in nearby West Covina.
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Next to the portable building housing the Head Start class are two more classrooms called Child Start鈥攁 collaboration involving federal Head Start money and state child-care funding that allows low-income working parents to have full-day, year-round care for their preschoolers.
The partnership with the California Department of Education鈥攍ike similar arrangements throughout the country鈥攕hows how 鈥渁 national program with local roots,鈥 as Mr. Wilkins calls it, can retain its identity, but still accommodate the needs of parents and an ever-expanding landscape of early-childhood-education programs.
鈥淚n 1965, they were the only kid on the block,鈥 said W. Steven Barnett, the director of the National Institute for Early Education Research, based at Rutgers University in New Brunswick, N.J. 鈥淚n 2005, that鈥檚 just not true.鈥
Competing Pressures
From the standpoint of the National Head Start Association, the Alexandria, Va.-based group that represents Head Start鈥檚 employees and families, the program has been on the defensive over the past several years.
Supporters say Head Start had to fight against what they labeled as an effort by the Bush administration to 鈥渄ismantle鈥 the program鈥攆irst by moving it to the Department of Education from the Department of Health and Human Services and second, by funding the program through block grants on a pilot basis for a handful of states.
Sarah Greene, the president of the National Head Start Association, said the intense spotlight on the program started early this decade, in part with some Republican members of Congress highlighting the fiscal troubles of certain grantees, leaving the public with the impression that mismanagement was widespread. (鈥淗efty Head Start Salaries Prompt Federal Inquiry,鈥 Oct. 22, 2003.)
鈥淭hose were vicious attacks,鈥 Ms. Greene said. 鈥淏ut we鈥檙e like any other agency. There are always a few people not doing their jobs the way they should.鈥
John Bancroft, the executive director of Head Start at the Puget Sound Educational Service District in Washington state, which serves suburban Seattle and suburban Tacoma, said President Bush鈥檚 then-new administration was trying to 鈥減ut its stamp on the program,鈥 maybe without realizing how negatively those proposals would be received by the Head Start community.
Launched in 1965, the Head Start program focuses mainly on children of families with incomes at or below the poverty line. It provides educational, health, nutrition, and social services.
ENROLLMENT
Enrollment in 1965 summer program: 561,000
Enrollment in 2005: 906,993
Children served since 1965: 23 million
PERCENTAGES
NUMBERS
Number of grantee agencies: 1,604
Number of paid staff members: 213,000
Number of volunteers: 1,360,000
SOURCE: Office of Head Start, Administration for Children and Families, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services
As the reauthorization process moves forward, Mr. Bancroft said he sees bipartisan cooperation on the Senate and House versions of the bills鈥攂oth of which include a provision that would drop the National Reporting System, a controversial package of tests administered to 4- and 5-year-olds twice a year.
鈥淚t has been quite a distraction,鈥 Mr. Bancroft said about the testing system, adding that on top of pre-existing assessments his program has used, the 鈥淣RS has been no use to us.鈥
But Mr. Wilkins said the test has been useful in determining how to design technical assistance. For example, past NRS results showed that children in the program needed stronger early-math skills, and so more attention has been focused on that area, he said. Last fall, the test also was expanded to include measures of social and emotional growth, long recommended by critics of the test, as well as by the Head Start administration鈥檚 own evaluation of the testing program.
鈥淭here have been tremendous gains when we were intentional,鈥 Mr. Wilkins said, adding that if the test is eliminated, 鈥渙ur ability to be informed will clearly be hampered.鈥
Danielle Ewen, the director of child-care and early-education policy at the Washington-based Center on Law and Social Policy (CLASP), said Head Start staff members have felt pressure over such issues as how their NRS results will be used or if they are spending their funds appropriately.
鈥淭here is an environment of fear that has been created in many programs,鈥 she said. 鈥淭hey鈥檙e worrying about those layers of accountability.鈥
Funding Squeeze
Head Start also has been buffeted by a leveling- off of funding that the NHSA says has left some programs in dire circumstances.
A loss of transportation services, a cutback on meal portions, and the dropping of some comprehensive services are among the sacrifices administrators report having made over the past six years of flat funding at about $6.8 billion annually.
Mr. Bancroft said that at the centers in his area, which serve 1,700 3- and 4-year-olds, the family-support workers have had to increase their caseloads, and programs to train and employ parents have been reduced. Teacher salaries, typically below those of kindergarten teachers or of teachers in many school-based prekindergarten programs, have also been frozen.
At the Child Start site in Covina, the budget restrictions were felt when staff members working for the state received cost-of-living pay increases, but the Head Start employees did not.
鈥淲e鈥檙e feeling it here on the front line,鈥 said Sandra Maldonado, an education coordinator for Options.
Mr. Wilkins doesn鈥檛 disagree that Head Start agencies have had to tighten spending, and also said that some years saw large increases in funding for program improvements.
鈥淭his has been an opportunity for them to look at their decisions. Maybe they weren鈥檛 as prudent as they should have been,鈥 he said.
Mr. Barnett, from NIEER, said that 鈥渢he decline in real purchasing power鈥 because of inflation in the past five years or so is probably even larger for Head Start programs than people think. He even speculates that the Bush administration is trying to 鈥渙ffload鈥 the program in more subtle ways after the failure of its plan to convert the program to one funded by block grants. 鈥淗olding the Head Start budget down is certainly one way to give states more responsibility,鈥 he said.
An example from Alabama may back up his theory. State Rep. Laura Hall, a Democrat, said recently that she is preparing a bill that would shift $1 million from state education funds to Head Start programs. She said she hopes her legislation will be approved 鈥渆specially in light of the fact that we do not have a statewide pre-K program.鈥 She added that 鈥淗ead Start鈥檚 40 years of service鈥 is one good reason for the state鈥檚 support.
Working With the Community
Head Start programs also are grappling with how agencies now fit into a broader mix of publicly funded school-readiness programs.
鈥淭here are Head Starts that have been successful at integrating鈥 children served by state preschool programs, Mr. Barnett said. 鈥淏ut there are others that have been very resistant and trying to do business as usual.鈥
Head Start was a pioneer in reaching out to existing programs though state collaboration offices, which led to partnerships such as joint teacher-training workshops and cross-agency committees.
鈥淭hat鈥檚 the idea of Head Start鈥攖o be able to work with the community,鈥 said Cherry Chua, the program manager at Options.
When programs work together, they are often able to serve more children. Even before the large growth in state preschool programs, Head Start centers in the 1990s teamed up with federally subsidized child-care centers to provide longer hours to children whose mothers were working to meet the requirements of new welfare laws.
But working with public prekindergarten programs鈥攚hich, in many states, allow Head Start providers to receive pre-K funding鈥攔aises different issues. Because state preschool programs tend to focus primarily on school-readiness skills, Head Start providers have expressed concern that other services such as health, nutrition, and family support, which are as much a part of the program as the educational component, will get pushed aside.
鈥淭hey feel that they are the keepers of comprehensive care, and the kids who need it the most are going to get lost,鈥 said Helene Stebbins, an analyst of early-childhood-education policy who recently co-authored a paper with CLASP on Head Start and pre-K collaboration.
If a state鈥檚 pre-K program serves children at the same family-income level as Head Start鈥攚hich is 100 percent of the federal poverty level鈥攁 turf war over children can develop.
Tonya Russell, the director of the division of child care and early-childhood education in the Arkansas Department of Health and Human Services, said a combination of events in her state led many Head Start providers to blame pre-K for a decline in Head Start enrollment.
First, the state in 2005 increased funding for the Arkansas Better Chance pre-K program, which serves low-income families. Around the same time, the federal government began requiring monthly enrollment counts from Head Start agencies, which don鈥檛 get paid for children who aren鈥檛 attending.
Demographic shifts in areas long served by Head Start also have affected the program, which had its birth in the African-American community. The gentrification of some urban neighborhoods means that families eligible for the program have moved elsewhere, and some Head Start classrooms are left underenrolled, and perhaps unprepared to reach out to new immigrant groups.
鈥淭here are clearly enough eligible children across the country,鈥 Mr. Wilkins said, arguing that some grantees may need to 鈥渆xpand their ways鈥 of attracting new families.
Preliminary results from a yet-to-be-released study by CLASP shows, for example, that even though Head Start programs might be adequately serving Spanish-speaking families, 鈥渢hey are not always providing meaningful access to non-English-speaking families鈥 from other immigrant groups, such as Cambodians or Vietnamese.
The Right Mix
Some observers, who argue that children benefit from being in classrooms with peers from different socioeconomic levels, say they don鈥檛 want to see Head Start continue to serve the poorest children while state preschool programs increasingly serve middle-class children.
鈥淪egregating poor kids is not a good idea,鈥 Mr. Barnett said, adding that mixing Head Start programs with pre-K programs can benefit Head Start, 鈥渂ecause people are willing to pay even more for poor kids in a program that is more universal.鈥
But a combination of Head Start, pre-K, and child-care children in the same classroom or center can also mean a collision between different sets of standards over features such as class size, square-footage, nutrition, and other services.
鈥淚t took us two years to get pre-K teachers to brush [children鈥檚] teeth,鈥 Gina Ruther, the Head Start collaboration director in Illinois, said about a long-standing practice in Head Start. 鈥淭hey鈥檙e still not doing home visits.鈥
In that state, which has had prekindergarten for 20 years, a variety of arrangements exist. Some agencies serve Head Start and pre-K children in separate classrooms. Some children are counted in both programs, which might mean they receive more hours of class time. And in other local programs, classes are even team-taught by Head Start and pre-K teachers in order to meet the staff-credentialing requirements of both programs.
Mr. Bancroft said that partnerships between programs can be an 鈥渁uditor鈥檚 nightmare.鈥
And Ms. Russell, in Arkansas, said some directors may worry about making mistakes that could show up on a monitoring report.
鈥淭here is a deep fear that [federal officials] will take our funding,鈥 she said, adding that staff members 鈥渏ust don鈥檛 want a checkmark by their name.鈥
Mr. Wilkins, however, said he has been 鈥渧ery clear that we鈥檙e interested in collaboration鈥 as long as it can be done without jeopardizing Head Start standards. He said he hopes Head Start providers feel supported by his office.
In Illinois, where Gov. Rod R. Blagojevich, a Democrat, has pledged to provide universal pre-K to both 3- and 4-year-olds, Ms. Ruther said she frequently tells grantees that they are in a 鈥渃ompetitive arena鈥 and that they need to promote what Head Start can offer that is different from what child-care and preschool programs provide.
鈥淚 try to remind people that, 鈥楿nless the feds do something to destroy you, Head Start provides families with some opportunities that the other two programs do not,鈥 鈥 she said. 鈥淎s long as Head Start is still in the picture, things will be OK. These are just struggles to go through as we get there.鈥
