History
of Head Start
Since its inception the purpose of Head Start has been to promote
school readiness by enhancing the social and cognitive development of
children through the provision of education, health, nutritional,
social and other comprehensive services to enrolled children and
families.
Head
Start is a national program administered through the Administration
for Children and Families in the U.S. Department of Health and Human
Services.
In
1965, the Office of Economic Opportunity launched Project Head Start
as an eight-week summer program. Head Start was part of the War on
Poverty, which embodied a basic belief in education as the solution to
poverty. Head Start was designed to help break the "cycle of
poverty" by providing preschool children of low income families
with a comprehensive program to meet their emotional, social, health,
nutritional, and psychological needs.
In
1969, Head Start was transferred from the Office of Economic
Opportunity to the Office of Child Development in the U.S. Department
of Health, Education, and Welfare. Head Start serves many American
Indian, migrant farm worker, urban and rural children and families in
all 50 States, the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico, the Virgin
Islands and Pacific Insular Areas.
Head
Start has grown from the eight-week demonstration project to include
full day/year services and many program options.
In
the mid-1990's, Early Head Start services for ages birth to 3 year
olds were formalized and expanded.
Currently,
Head Start and Early Head Start serves nearly one million low-income
children and their families each year.
*Pocatello/Chubbuck
School District #25 Head Start serves 186 children and their families
through our classrooms in the Lincoln Early Childhood Center
(Pocatello) and Tyhee Elementary (Tyhee). We have been offering
quality Pre-K Early Childhood Education in our community since Head
Start began in 1965, making us one of the oldest Head Start programs
in the nation.
