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Reauthorizing Head Start: The Future Federal Role in Preschool Programs for the Poor
http://www.nhpf.org/library/details.cfm/2410
Jane Koppelman

This paper describes the implications of President Bush's proposal to devolve authority for running the Head Start program to the states and to alter the organization and funding of all government early childhood programs�with the goal of improving the school readiness skills of low-income children. The administration plan to allow states to mix Head Start funds with state-funded preschool money and, if desired, child care monies to create a more uniform early childhood care system with an educational focus raises numerous questions. This paper addresses questions raised by this plan, including the potential quality of these new systems, the extent to which the programs will offer health and family support services (as Head Start now does), the capacity of states to administer large-scale preschool systems, and the prospects for adequate funding of new systems, given state budget deficits and demands for providing more child care for low-income working parents.

(Excerpted from Reauthorizing Head Start: The Future Federal Role in Preschool Programs for the Poor; a National Health Policy Forum Issue Brief, Number 789, April 11, 2003, a publication of the National Health Policy Forum, http://www.nhpf.org/, and used with the permission of the National Health Policy Forum)

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Free To Grow is a national program supported by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation with direction and technical assistance provided by the Mailman School of Public Health of Columbia University.