Sacramento Head Start Alumni Association

SUCCESS OF HEAD START -- SCHOOL READINESS

Jan 08, 2003

This interim report presents procedures, problems and multiple outcomes
from an ongoing longitudinal follow-along study of a representative
sample of more than 600 Preschool Services Department (PSD) Head Start
graduates who have now completed kindergarten (Wave I, 2000-01 and Wave
II, 2001-2002). This pilot study was begun in response to U.S.
Congressional 1998 Head Start reauthorization legislation and local San
Bernardino County Board of Supervisors?’ mandate that PSD track the progress
of children and families it has served. The preliminary findings
clearly indicate that the PSD Head Start program does adequately prepare its
participant children and families to successfully enter and complete
public school kindergarten. Although never described as a life-long
inoculation against future difficulties in life?’s developmental odyssey,
this early childhood experience proactively sets the stage for continued
adjustment, resilience and success. Moreover, related hypothetical
benefit-to-cost analyses indicate that for every one dollar expended on a
typical Head Start child and family, the greater society benefits over
time by as much as nine dollars in eliminated or reduced costs of
welfare dependency, school grade repetition, special education and crime
plus the graduate?’s probability of increased educational attainments,
employment time and earnings (and taxes paid), and next-generation family
stability. It is also suggested that the current comprehensive
characteristics of the Head Start program and tested national performance
standards constitute exemplary child-care program leadership and favorably
impact the entire society?’s quality of preschool child nurturance and
parent involvement. This all further emphasizes the necessity and
affordability of a high quality preschool experience to prepare all of
America?’s young children for successful school entry and continued
achievement.

HISTORY & DESCRIPTION OF KINDERGARTEN READINESS PILOT STUDY:

A comprehensive School Readiness Evaluation Study was proposed,
developed and begun in program year 1999-2000. Several complications in
budgeting, staffing, and more pressing pragmatic program priorities reduced
the original scope and ideal design to a Kindergarten Readiness Pilot
Study (KRPS) without formal control or comparison groups. Nevertheless,
through great effort and perseverance, especially with the multiple
school systems into which the Head Start graduates transitioned, some
credible estimates of the children?’s kindergarten readiness and reported
kindergarten performance were derived. A major logistics challenge
involved dealing with 23 separate public school districts (containing 181
elementary schools) scattered throughout the geographically largest county
in the contiguous U.S. into which the subject PSD Head Start graduates
transitioned. Many pragmatic data-gathering adjustments and use of
numerous proxy measures and data reports were necessary to evaluate the
readiness and actual performance of the KRPS sample population. The
processes and results of accommodating to many unforeseen difficulties in
getting meaningful data were themselves a part of the investigation and
were quite instructive for future transition policies and procedures as
well as research design and methodology for similar school readiness &/
or preschool outcomes studies. Moreover, since there is a parallel and
growing concern regarding accountability within the public school
system in California (and nationally), this KRPS work in progress became a
timely research/evaluation opportunity to share and collaborate with the
greater educational and human services community.

Findings from PY 1999-200 (Wave I), for example, compared pre- to
post-test differences on a PSD Child Development Screening Test & School
Readiness Supplement (academically oriented, i.e., focussed on literacy
and numeracy) and revealed positive and significant changes (<. 05
level), which was especially gratifying with children who had certified
disabilities. The reported and documented successful performance of these
Head Start graduates upon entering and recently completing kindergarten
(reflected in formal report cards and informal anecdotes from throughout
the kindergarten school year), all attest to Head Start?’s adequate
preparation for entry into and completion of kindergarten. Wave II involved
an enlarged sample of 600 subjects, approximately 10% of the total PSD
Head Start population, with allowance for inevitable attrition. Also
some modified &/ or different data sources, instruments and procedures
were used e.g. , High/Scope Child Observation Record & Kindergarten
Transition Report and yielded data now being subjected to analysis of
variance (ANOVA) and related statistical regression analyses and reporting
formats. Current inspection of these data and preliminary analyses
strongly confirm and reinforce Wave I findings and trends.

Admittedly, the differential developmental changes among preschool
children, with and without various preschool experiences, cannot be
scientifically determined without legitimate control, contrast and/or other
comparison groups (as originally proposed and now being field-tested by
the National Head Start Impact Study, in which PSD happily is now a
participant, starting in PY 2002). The use of non-parametric statistics
with small Ns or the assessment of idiosyncratic changes within each
subject as his/her own control are explored as adjunct techniques to
describe the full kaleidoscopic impact of such preschool experiences and
programs. The statistical power to detect minimal effects or differences as
well as regression data discontinuities or ?“jumps?”, promises to reveal
other Head Start preschool impacts, suggesting ?“jump-start?” as part of
the evolving prevention vocabulary. Nevertheless, the KRPS interim
findings are both encouraging and also revealing of the many additional
measurable variables and challenging hurdles to be considered in doing
such outcomes studies, especially when they span several years and
engage many outside community organizations.

CORRELATED LONGITUDINAL PROGRAM BENEFIT/COST FACTORS & OUTCOMES

Besides tracking the outcomes for child and family
participants and beneficiaries in PSD?’s preschool programs, it is
illuminating to consider several of the estimated economic impacts of one
year?’s operation of PSD?’s Head Start operation on the County of San
Bernardino. This KRPS interim report of preschool outcomes analyzes not only
the immediate measured impact on participant preschool graduates (and
their families) but also projects broader and longitudinal societal
costs and benefits. This hypothetical analysis considers such variables as
prevention of predictably costly factors including repeated school
grades, special education, unrealized income due to failure to graduate
from high school or college, associated juvenile crime and delinquency,
unemployment and welfare (including lost taxes), family dysfunction or
disintegration, etc. ?– not to mention the immeasurable expense of low
human self-esteem and unhappiness on the part of the low-income families
and children who subsequently ?“fail?” within the larger society.

The KRPS addendum details many of the immediate and projected societal
costs and benefits attributable to a single hypothetical participant,
who some 30+ years ago participated in the PSD Head Start program.
Using the most reasonable of the underlying discounted values, the yield
is a benefit-to-cost ratio of nearly 9 to 1 ($8.74 includes $7.16 in
benefits to the general public including taxpayers and crime victims and
$1.58 in benefits to program participants -- adjusted for inflation).
This suggests that for every one dollar spent on the preschool
participant, the county/society benefited over time by as much as nine dollars
in subsequent increased earnings, employment, family stability and
reduced welfare dependency, grade repetition, special education, crime
costs, etc. When these calculations are multiplied by the number of
children per classroom (ave. 17) times the number of classes times 37 years
of PSD operation (about 90,000 children and low-income families), the
financial impact is enormous. Taking each child and family into
consideration, their developmental trajectories have been improved dramatically
in ways that cannot be measured in dollars alone. Prevention programs
have the vexing burden of proving that some otherwise probable disaster
or deficit did not occur because of their anticipatory proactive
efforts. Furthermore, the operation of the Head Start program itself
contributed multiple jobs, upward mobility, rent, transportation and various
other benefits to the local host county?’s economy. The collective
national impact of such studies as this KRPS, coupled with the incoming
findings from more thorough longitudinal impact investigations now
underway, promises further cogent rationale for universal, high-quality
preschool programs for all young children in the USA.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS & APPRECIATION TO:

PSD Head Start Parents -- entrusting their beloved children to PSD's
Head Start Program and willingly giving informed consent for data
collection; PSD Head Start Children -- happy participants & future solid
citizens; PSD staff -- site administrators and teachers for ably conducting
preschool classes and documenting child observations; PSD management
and Shared Governance Board (Parent Policy Council and San Bernardino
County Board of Supervisors) for encouraging this KRPS; PSD Special
Services Division dedicated staff for data collection and inputting; Local
Public School District administration and staff for their gracious
cooperation in retrieving and sending kindergarten information; Research
community collaborators & colleagues (i.e., Yale Univ., Univ. Calif.,
Riverside, Calif. State Univ. San Bernardino), California and National Head
Start Associations, U.S. Admin. For Children Youth and Families, local
and national congressional interests, all for their generous
suggestions and encouragement; and the national Head Start program, the world's
largest early childhood laboratory, with nearly 38 years of advancing
the state of the art & science regarding the growth and development of
preschool children and their low-income families.


PRESCHOOL SERVICES DEPARTMENT OF SAN BERNARDINO COUNTY
250 So. Lena Road, San Bernardino, CA 92408
Attn: John Meier, (909) 387-2375 or jmeier@psd.sbcounty.gov