Head Start Agency - Research Paper Example

Head Start Agency Formation of Agency Head Start Agency is a federal program focused on providing health, education, social services, and nutrition services to children from birth until the age of five years born in low-income families (Butler et al., 2004). The program targets to promote learning of children in areas of physical development, cognition and general knowledge, language and literacy, physical development, learning approaches, social and emotional development (Palmaffy, 2011). Also, there are other programs helping pregnant women, infants, toddlers and families with income lower than federal poverty level (Rosenbloom, 2014). The agency operates in accordance with the description of services stipulated in the Head Start Performance Standards and also the Head Starts Act of 2007 (Diane, 2007). The agency is funded the government through the United States Department of Health and Human Services (HHS). Head Start Agency started in May 1965. The idea of its formation was initiated by President Lyndon Johnson while working as a teacher in in the hardscrabble of West Texas where he witnessed immense poverty and developed an ideology that education was the only powerful tool for eradicating poverty (Sawhill & Haskins, 2003). His idea turned into reality during the “heady, idealistic days of the Great Society’s war on poverty” (Palmaffy, 2011). The war on poverty was spearheaded by the Community Action Programs (CAPs) with an intention of rallying the poor for their own sake. Following the wrangles in CAP the local officials became uneasy to apply for the CAPs grants (Sawhill & Haskins, 2003). However, due to a budget surplus and administrative pressure that required the officials either to use or lose the grants there was an emerging need of getting another way of helping the poor community (Butler et al., 2004). Sargent Shriver, the director of the Office of Economic Opportunity (OEO), went looking for viable political anti-poverty project that led to the establishment of Head Start program (Diane, 2007). The program received great support and funding in 1970s and 80s following the establishment that children had higher gain in IQ during their early years, and that diminished with age (Sawhill & Haskins, 2003). That led to increased support for the program to ensure its success. Reasons for the formation of Head Start Agency The formation of Head Start agency was based on policy for eradicating poverty following the passage of Economic Opportunity Act of 1964. The formation of Head Start agency was based on believe that providing quality education to the children from a poor background could empower them to overcome the poverty barriers in the families and the community (Palmaffy, 2011). There was the perception that helping poor children to acquire quality education could save the community the cost of handling later pressures on social services and justice system (Diane, 2007). The desire to develop preschool programs was backed by ideologies of the early scholars such as Benjamin Bloom and Joseph McVicker Hunt, who established the importance of fixing Children’s’ IQ through early education (Palmaffy, 2011). Those findings further emphasized on the importance of the first five years of children lives in developing their intellectual capacities. For this reason, Head Start was established to offer medical, emotional, social, educational services to children and families from a poor background (Rosenbloom, 2014). The logic was that malnourished children with poor health, with emotional instability and poor parental relationships and lacking social services cannot focus on education (Diane, 2007). Provision of these services could aid in relaxing the effect of poverty among individuals and families. The agency recognizes the effort of parents in providing the children with first education (Rosenbloom, 2014). The Head Start program encourages the well-being of the families, family interactions with peers, family educators, foster relationship between children and the parents and advocacy of peer relationships between families, community and the leaders (Sawhill & Haskins, 2003). The linking of the program with CAP strengthened the significance of parental involvement because the parents from a poor background had the opportunity to learn various child-rearing techniques. Their participation in the program as employees and volunteers strengthened their voice in running community programs (Palmaffy, 2011). In addition, the agency was connected to civil rights movements in the war against poverty hence the formation of Head Start agency was viewed as an avenue to provide power to the minority parents in public schools (Rosenbloom, 2014). Future goals of the Agency Head Start offers grants to private and public agencies competitively in order to ensure complete services to particular communities (Rosenbloom, 2014). However, some federal, states and cities programs provide financial support to develop Head Start and encourage Early Head Start to more children in their regions. Since its inception the Head Start, Agency has served about thirty million children and families living in poverty, and currently it serves about one million children annually to promote learning (Butler et al., 2004). Apart from learning the program provide other support to the community based on their needs. Also, the program brings together community members that are enrolled to receive home-based services to share the learning experiences spearheaded by the Head Start staff (Sawhill & Haskins, 2003). The demand for child care is on the increase as more people join a labor force especially mothers (Sawhill & Haskins, 2003). The trend for child care and preschool education continues to change since more parents have little time to care for their children (Rosenbloom, 2014). By 1970, only 40% of women were in labor force while, in 2000, the number had increased to 70%. The federal government established Child Care and Development Block Grant (CCDBG) in 1990 that provides about $5billion annually to states for helping children from poor families meet child care (Diane, 2007). Many preschool child care programs have developed over time resulting in diversification of care. When the Head Start program started, there were available to limited facilities available to prepare children for school. However, over time most states opened up preschool programs or use state funds to enlarge Head Start (Butler et al., 2004) Currently, the child care market exists for two different reasons. One of the reasons for the existence of child care market is to cater for the children of the parents who are either at work furthering their studies (Legal Information Institute, 2006). Although most of these facilities are of inferior quality, a small proportion has still maintained high standard similar to preschool programs. The other category is that designed to prepare children for school (Diane, 2007). The establishment of child care and preschool program has increased economic opportunity for women, economic viability of the families and improved health of the national economy. The focus is to expand the employment and income of low-income single mothers (Rosenbloom, 2014). The preschool programs aim at equalizing education opportunity for children from a poor background with those from wealth families (Butler et al., 2004). In order to expand, the activities of Head Start states will be involved in running preschool programs in their respective states. In addition, the states aims at improving curriculum for preschool programs including Head Start, increase accountability and improve coordination with public schools in order to ensure improved quality and expansion of the program (Sawhill & Haskins, 2003). Head Start Agency Relationship with Executive Branch and Biography on the Head of Agency Head Start program is a government initiative to improve the welfare of the poor families by providing school readiness services (Legal Information Institute, 2006). The agency receives funding from the federal to finance its activities. The executive is part of the government with absolute responsibility for daily supervision of the state. The executive branch establishes the code of federal regulations that guide the administration of an agency and ensure the implementation of regulations. The agency was established under the Act of U.S. (Palmaffy, 2011). The federal regulation establishes standard requirements for the agency to address the issue of poverty among the children from poor families (Rosenbloom, 2014). In addition, the executive defines the protocol for implementation of standards of performance and makes review of the agency to ensure the compliance with the federal standards. Finally, the Executive is responsible for appointing the heads of agencies including the head of Head Start Agency (Diane, 2007).Biography of head of Agency Naomi Goldstein: She was appointed in 2004 as the “Director of the Office of Planning, Research and Evaluation (OPRE) in the Administration for Children and Families (ACF) at the department of Health and Human Services” (Diane, 2007). She offers advice to Assistant Secretary for Children and Families on how to boost efficiency and effectiveness of the ACF programs (Diane, 2007). She holds a B.A. in Philosophy (Yale University), Masters in public policy (Kennedy School of Government) and Ph.D. in Public policy (Harvard University). She has worked in various organizations and different capacities such as project manager for Urban Institute and an Executive Officer in the office of Assistant Secretary for Planning and Evaluation at HHS (Palmaffy, 2011). Initially, she worked in Massachusetts state government and developed a program on infant mortality program. She worked as a director in the United States Postal Service Commission on Safe and Secure Workplace, and a Director of Division of Child and Family Development in OPRE prior to her appointment in her current position (Palmaffy, 2011). In 2012 she received an award of Presidential Rank of Distinguished Executive. Supreme Court Case In the case of Head Start Family Education Program, Inc. (HSFEP) V. Cooperative Educational Service Agency (CESA), the plaintiff (HSFEP), the plaintiff filed a case challenging the selection procedure applied by ACF to appoint CESA as the grantee for Head State. The plaintiff opposes the appointment of the defendant as its grantee claiming that the selection breached the Head Start Act and HHS regulations. The district court claimed that ACF followed the due procedure for appointment and that the defendant satisfied all requirements for the Head States grantee (Rosenbloom, 2014). The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) provides financial support to the agency nominated as Head Start Grantee for conducting Head Start programs. To achieve the goals of the program, the Head Start grantee must comply with requirements established by the secretary (Diane, 2007). The plaintiff was against the procedure applied by ACF to select the defendant as Head Start grantee since the plaintiff had scored highest points in its application. The defendant asserted that HSFEP lacked standing to defy the grant award to CESA because the plaintiff lacked a statutory power to be awarded Head Start grant (Rosenbloom, 2014). However, the appellate court waved the claim by stating that the plaintiff and CESA had close scores of 236 against 223 and that difference could warrant ACF to apply other criteria for selection (Palmaffy, 2011). The plaintiff further argued that they deserved the grant award because they were the only applicants that satisfied HHS regulations and Head Start Act and the requirements of Article III and is appropriate to deliberate standing under s 702 of the APA (Legal Information Institute, 2006). On the other hand, the defendant claimed that the ACF’s judicial review, for appointing CESA, is excluded by s702 (a) (2) of the APA. Under s 986(a) of title 42, the Head State grantee chosen by the secretary must have capacity and authority to implement the purposes prescribed in s 1937 within the community (Diane, 2007). In addition, s 9836 (d) establishes nine factors that Secretary must evaluate when assessing the effectiveness of each applicant to deliver Head Start services. The chief executive officer of the state should be given a chance to evaluate the procedure for selecting the grantee (Palmaffy, 2011). In addition, HHS regulations establish the procedure for selecting the grantee. For this reason, the judicial analysis of the procedure for selecting Head Start grantee established that the Secretary had option to award the grant to the qualified applicant. For this reason, the Secretary infringed the Head Start Act and its own requirements by declaring WESTCAP and CESA as suitable applicants (Legal Information Institute, 2006). HSFEP objected the district court’s decision to award summary judgment to the defendant despite the incomplete administrative records of the district court (Butler et al., 2004). The appellate court waived the allegation because HSFEP had failed its own motion by because they did raise the argument of incompleteness of records before a district court (Sawhill & Haskins, 2003). For this reason, the appellate court upheld the district court’s decision after waiving all arguments presented by the appellant by stating that ACF had followed an appropriate procedure for appointing the Head State Grantee. Conclusion Head Start agency has been running programs aimed at improving the lives of the poor preschool children and their families since its inception in 1965. The services they offer include health, nutrition, education and mental health. The goals of the agency are to provide school readiness services and child development as the federal government’s initiative to fight poverty. The success of the program is based on believe that improving the wellbeing of the child and their environment at an early age can improve intelligence of the child. The federal government provides funding to the agency for various activities assessing child’s outcome, designing curriculum for early childhood education, and planning for childhood education. Apart from administering the preschool childcare and educational planning it also sets standards and practices for ensuring equitable learning and children. They evaluate the community needs to ensure the program serves the intended purpose. Furthermore, they strengthen relationship between parents and children to ensure the better school readiness services for children below five years of age. Bibliography Butler, A., Gish, M., Shaul, M. (2004). Head Start. Nova Publishers Diane, (2007). Head Start for School Readiness Act. DIANE Publishing Legal Information Institute, (2006). Powers and functions of Head Start agencies. United States Code, Supplement 3, Vol. 4. Retrieved from Palmaffy, T. (2011). Head Start: The War on Poverty goes to school. Presidents and Fellows of Harvard College. http://educationnext.org/head-start/ Rosenbloom, D. H. (2014). Administrative Law for Public Managers. United States: Westview Press. Sawhill, I. V. & Haskins, R. (2003). The Future of Head Start Series: CCF Briefs, No. 27 Read More