Head Start is a program of the United States Department of Health and Human Services that offers comprehensive education, health, nutrition, and parent involvement services to low-income children and their families.
Head Start began in 1964 and was later updated by the Head Start Act of 1981. It is the longest-running program to tackle the systemic poverty in the United States. As of late 2005[update], more than 22 million pre-school aged children have participated in Head Start. The $6.8+ billion dollar budget for 2005 provided services to more than 905,000 children, 57% of whom were four years old or older, and 43% three years old or younger. Services were given by 1,604 different programs operating more than 48,000 classrooms scattered across every state (and nearly every county) at an average cost of $7,222 per child. The staff consists of nearly 212,000 paid personnel in addition to six times as many volunteers.
History
Head Start was initiated as part of President Lyndon Johnson’s War on Poverty and Great Society. It was modeled on the Little School of the 400. The Economic Opportunity Act of 1964 had a single line authorizing program, and the Act gave broad powers to the Office of Economic Opportunity, which began the program. The Elementary and Secondary Education Act of 1965 also addressed preschool education.
The Office of Economic Opportunity’s Community Action Program launched Project Head Start as an eight-week summer program in 1965. The project was intended to help end poverty by offering preschool children from low-income families with a program that would meet emotional, social, health, nutritional, and psychological needs. The following year it was authorized by Congress as a fully-funded year-round program. In 1981, the Head Start Act was passed.
Head Start was then moved to the Office of Child Development in the Department of Welfare (later the Department of Health and Human Services) by the Nixon Administration in 1969. Today it is a program within the Administration for Children and Families (ACF) in the HHS. In FY 1995, the Early Head Start program was established to serve children from birth to three years of age in recognition of the mounting evidence that the earliest years matter a great deal to children’s growth and development. Programs are administered locally by non-profit organizations and local education agencies such as school systems. In the United Statesm, Head Start is a program for children age 3 to 5.