Conference Report on H.R. 1429, Improving Head Start for School Readiness Act of 2007

Press Release

CONFERENCE REPORT ON H.R. 1429, IMPROVING HEAD START FOR SCHOOL READINESS ACT OF 2007 -- (House of Representatives - November 14, 2007)

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Mr. MARKEY. Mr. Speaker, I rise in support of this conference report.

Let me start by commending the chairman of the subcommittee, the distinguished gentleman from Michigan, Mr. KILDEE, and the chairman of the full committee, the gentleman from California, Mr. MILLER for their work on this bill. I offer my thanks to the House and Senate conferees for bringing forth this important piece of legislation today.

In 1965, with a great deal of hard work, Head Start was created. It soon became a ``legislative Lamborghini'' of social programs, going from 0 to 561,000 thousand participants in only a few months. In the 42 years since its inception, Head Start has become the educational foundation for more than 20 million American children.

Education serves as both a ladder of opportunity and an investment in our future. Our Nation's security, economy, and position in the world all depend on the success of our education system. We must take advantage of this opportunity to fund our future.

Head Start and Early Head Start are linchpins in the effort to prepare our country's most disadvantaged children to succeed in school and life. Many studies indicate that children enrolled in Head Start make significant progress in closing the readiness gap to their more advantaged peers as they enter kindergarten.

The congressionally mandated impact study recently published its results, which noted that after less than 1 year in the program, children in Head Start had narrowed the readiness gap by 45 percent in reading skills and 28 percent in writing skills. This momentum continues well beyond the ages of 3, 4, and 5, as another large academic study has noted that Head Start graduates continue to mount academic gains well after leaving the program.

The bill we see before us today helps to raise the academic standards of American children and ensures that every child in our country has an equal opportunity to a high quality education. It aims to improve teacher quality by requiring a greater number of Head Start teachers to have a bachelor's degree and be adequately trained in early childhood development. This is clearly good news for the children that will be participating in Head Start in the future.

On multiple occasions, the President has advocated that all 3- and 4-year-old participants in Head Start should take standardized tests to assess their improvement. For President Bush, No Child Left Behind means no child left untested. I am happy that this conference report terminates the further use of the National Reporting System, an inappropriate, ineffective, and expensive testing regime.

This conference report notes that Head Start is not without the opportunity for evaluation, however, and there is strengthened program accountability at the Federal, regional, and local levels included in the legislation. The report also requires the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services to initiate classroom evaluations, thereby ensuring optimal teacher-child interactions.

We have known for some time that when children are not provided high-quality day care and early childhood services, once in school, their academic achievement and limited language proficiencies become cumulatively worse over time, over grade levels, and across all subject areas. By passing this conference report, we build on the past 42 years of success for this program and help ensure that both Head Start children as well as our Nation as a whole have a brighter tomorrow.

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