Head Start, the largest federally funded program for children under 5, has been offering free preschool and health services to poor children and their families for nearly 45 years. It has seen growth and stagnation, controversy and quiet. Today, with the Obama Administration signaling its intent to increase federal funding to support young children, one might think that Head Start was poised to enter one of its most expansive periods ever.
But there are several huge unanswered questions about Head Start's future. In recent years, parents and politicians have found themselves drawn instead to state-funded pre-K programs. Indeed, by 2008, more children at ages 3 and 4 were enrolled in state-funded pre-K programs than in Head Start. State programs enroll about 1.1 million preschoolers, while Head Start serves about 920,000 in that age range.* As Georgetown University researcher William Gormley wrote last year, "A silent revolution in early childhood has occurred."
Some may assume that these two types of publicly funded preschool programs are on a collision course. But are they really? Think of them as trains whose purpose is to deliver children to elementary school ready and eager to learn. Are they on different tracks that eventually arrive at the same place? Or are they trying to share the same track? Could one rail system become better integrated with the other?
It's impossible to arrive at good answers without a better understanding of how Head Start has evolved and how it compares and interoperates with current state-funded pre-K programs today. That is the mission of Early Ed Watch for the next two weeks. Based on interviews and research, six upcoming posts will
- explore how new rules in the program's 2007 reauthorization are affecting Head Start;
- check assumptions about the program's effectiveness;
- provide updates on how Head Start approaches the teaching of pre-literacy;
- explain how "comprehensive" services fit into the picture;
- highlight trends that show Head Start getting "younger" and;
- provide some guideposts for what's ahead.
This first post is designed to serve as a starting point, providing basic information about Head Start's mission and enrollment compared to state-funded programs. It's important to remember, for example, that Head Start is for the poorest of the poor, while families of many different income levels are eligible for state-funded pre-K. Some states, like Oklahoma and Georgia, offer it to everyone regardless of income. Others, like Illinois, have opened their programs first to low-income children with the intention of adding more families as funding becomes available.
Head Start's origins are also different from those of state-funded pre-K. Head Start was envisioned as a preschool-like environment that offered health and nutrition services, not to mention new ways for parents to get engaged. In contrast, states' pre-K programs often grew out of an emphasis on cognitive development, particularly the teaching of early literacy skills. Yet in recent years, as we'll describe in forthcoming blog posts, the gulf between these two objectives has narrowed and the missions of these two approaches are starting to sound more and more alike.
Fluctuations in funding at both the state and federal level will play a big role in determining the future of both types of programs. The full impact of the recession is yet to be known, but one possibility is that fiscal year 2009 will come to look like a high-water mark for state pre-K investment. In budgeting for 2010, for example, Illinois made cuts to its pre-K budget. In Ohio, the recession pushed legislators to eliminate the Early Learning Initiative. Meanwhile, the federal stimulus bill passed in February provided Head Start with a $2.1 billion boost, half of which goes toward a massive expansion of the Early Head Start program serving pregnant women and children up to 3. The federal stimulus is also paying for quality improvements and pay raises for Head Start staff, as well as shortening waiting lists for 3- and 4-year-olds.
Lastly, tighter collaboration between Head Start and state-funded pre-K programs -- urged for years -- is now happening in many cities and states. Some pre-K programs blend state and federal funding to expand access and services. In fact, about 14,000 children, according to NIEER, attend Head Start programs that double as state-funded pre-K programs. (A 2007 report from the Center for Law and Social Policy and PreK Now provides some examples of how collaboration can work.) Some states rely on Head Start to take on one task, such as reaching the most impoverished or enrolling 3-year-olds, while states do another, such as paying pre-K teachers to cover the morning hours.