Does Head Start Work?

I have heard many, many comments over the last couple of months about a study released in December, 2012 on the impact of Head Start (the OPRE report). I have heard from various commentators that this study proves that Head Start does not work, that it has no impact on the children we serve. And yet this could not be further from the truth.

If one reads the study that these commentators refer to, they will find the report full of positive comments about Head Start. Here is one:

“There were statistically significant differences between the Head Start group and the control group on every measure of children’s preschool experiences measured in this study.”

It also states that “The differences in magnitude were quite large, driven in part by the large proportion of children in the control group who were in parent care (i.e. nearly four out of ten children remained at home with their parents when Head Start was unavailable to them). Yet, analyses excluding those children, and thus comparing only children in Head Start and control groups who were in non-parental care, largely showed the same pattern of differences, albeit somewhat smaller.” Differences on every measure. The differences were quite large. These are just a few of the many positive findings throughout the study.

I am using the very study that is being cited as showing that Head Start does not work, and it clearly shows how well it does work! Critics however have latched onto the fact that the study shows that the positive impacts of Head Start seem to disappear by the third grade. Let us think about this finding for a moment...

This study shows that Head Start children, in one or two years of service provision, receiving a half-day of services over the school year, had significantly positive impacts versus a similar demographic control group. But, over the course of three full years of schooling after the fact, their gains diminish. The study states that after leaving Head Start “the study children attended schools with much higher levels of poverty than schools nationwide with higher proportions of minority students.” In addition to the schools that these children attend, we must remember that they are members of families who are below the Federal poverty level. They do not have the resources at home that many of us who are fortunate have to continue to support their children’s education after they leave preschool. We all remember that parents are the number one teacher, right?

I am not writing these things to blame elementary schools or parents for the results of this study. These  groups do as much as they can for the children they love, and face immense obstacles that we must continue to help eliminate. My point is that what we become as adults is not because of some magical year or two in our lives as children. It is the combination of educational experiences throughout our childhood; flowing from our parents, each of our schools, and the communities where we live. To suddenly expect Head Start to maintain gains well after children have moved on to other schools and the rest of their lives seems ridiculous to me.

Up to this point I have commented exclusively on the study that is cited itself. But another point that critics neglect is that there are hundreds of other studies that show Head Start’s positive impacts well beyond the 3^rd grade, and in fact into adulthood. The OPRE report itself states that “we do not yet know if there will be positive outcomes for HSIS (Head Start Impact Study) participants later in life, however, research suggests that positive outcomes later in life are possible.” These studies consistently show that Head Start impacts include higher educational attainment, higher earnings, crime reduction, less use of public assistance, and lower mortality rates, to name a few. Just one example of these studies was produced by Harvard’s David Deming. His study found that Head Start’s long-term impact “is about 80 percent as large as the gains from the Perry Preschool and Carolina Abecedarian” programs. These programs are viewed as two of the most effective preschools in the country!  Head Start costs about one-third as much.

I invite readers to do a web search on “Head Start Impact.” You will find lots of commentary on the OPRE study, many that use it to point out that Head Start does not work. You will also find lots of results leading you to other studies that contradict the OPRE study. Read the OPRE study and some of these other studies and form your own opinions.  I am confident that you will feel as I do, that the incredible work that our Head Start program does is a fantastic investment in our children and our nation’s future.

Where Will You Be in 2015?

At the beginning of a new year, many people set resolutions or goals for what they want to accomplish in the upcoming year. At CANI, we set resolutions every three years for where we would like to be – these resolutions are called our Strategic Plan.

Last Thursday night CANI’s board approved our Strategic Plan, which will guide our efforts at eliminating poverty through 2015. One of my favorite things about working here is that we have a philosophy that we’ll accomplish a lot more if we are ambitious and come up short, versus being conservative and accomplishing everything. And as usual, we have adopted a very ambitious strategic plan.

We have six long-range goals:

1.      The first, in a nutshell, is to develop an integrated system of services that can meet any needs for any family we see. This goal includes providing a host of programs that we have traditionally provided as well as developing programs that are needed in the community but not provided by anyone else. For instance, a major objective for the next three years is to develop new homelessness prevention programs, as well as expand services to Veterans.

2.      The second goal is to increase the provision of services that build assets for families and individuals. In truth, most of our programs are aimed at building assets, but this goal might be considered to mean more direct, higher impact asset-building activities like increasing access to capital by expanding our lending programs.

3.      Our third goal is all about community development, because we know that we must work on the conditions that low-income people live in as well as their own individual issues. In addition to housing development and system-building, we will expand our advocacy efforts, expand our AmeriCorps program to better support other organizations, provide capacity-building assistance to other organizations, and be available to step up as a convener of community collaborations.

4.      We also recognize that to provide great service, we must be a great organization. We have a detailed plan to do just that - our Blueprint to Greatness. This plan includes a significant number of initiatives modeled after Jim Collins’ “Good to Great”. We will enhance our board and staff, continue to ensure excellent accountability and transparency, and increase our technology, to name a few examples.

5.      The fifth goal relates to increasing our public awareness and increasing our flexible financial resources. Increasing awareness of poverty is a key strategy for us, as this leads to better understanding across the community of issues low-income families face, which in turn leads to better advocacy, greater support for CANI and our partners, and even more people helping their neighbors. We also want to increase our fundraising efforts, expand our Energy Saver Consultants business, and expand our fee-for-service activities.

6.      Our last goal basically relates to most of the others to one degree or another. We need to increase the focus on our service area outside of Fort Wayne. CANI’s service area includes twelve counties in northeast Indiana. The majority of the low-income families in this area live in Fort Wayne, but there are thousands of low-income people that live outside of Fort Wayne. 

I am always excited after we complete one strategic plan and develop a new one. This is the fourth strategic plan I have worked on at CANI, and as I look back I can see the truly impressive impact of our process. We have never accomplished all that we set out to do, but we have always accomplished many great things in our plans. This plan will be no different, and we've already gotten started!

For much more detail, check out the plan for yourself at http://www.canihelp.org/WhoWeAre/Documents/strategic_plan.pdf

Employees Excel During Busiest Time of the Year

Every year, when winter starts to hit and the temperature drops, our utility assistance season kicks into high gear. This is a program that we value greatly, because it gives us the opportunity to reach thousands of households across northeast Indiana. But it is definitely our most difficult program to administer.

The heating assistance portion of the program provides financial assistance on heating bills to families who qualify. The amount they receive is based on a number of factors, such as income level, heating type, and more. It is a critical basic need for most of these families; without it they would struggle to keep their heat on during the winter. Quite literally, some individuals would freeze to death without this service.

This piece of the program runs from November through May this year, a shorter time frame than we have had in previous years. Because of this shorter window, the large number of families we need to serve and the limited funding provided to run the program, we definitely battle every year to make it all happen.

We have hundreds of people calling our office every day, and despite having three staff answering phones, the hold times are long. Despite an organized appointment system and staff working diligently, we have many people coming in with emergencies every day, further swamping the caseload.

The sheer volume is one thing, but the issues that our families face are also difficult, sometimes heart-wrenching. CANI employees work here because they want to make a difference in people’s lives, but that work can become overwhelming at times.

I know that this is our busiest, most stressful time of the entire year. That is what makes me even more proud of our employees during this time. The Family Support staff work extremely hard to get people their services. Other departments pitch in to help when we get overloaded. Despite the massive numbers, we always serve the most people that we can, as well as we can.

Because we are CANI and that is what we do here.