Update on Head Start Reauthorization in the 109th Congress
Reauthorization in the House
On September 22, 2005, the House of Representatives voted 220 to 196 to support H.R. 2123, a bill to reauthorize the Head Start program. The bill passed largely along party lines due to a very controversial amendment added to the legislation at the last moment that allows Head Start programs run by faith-based providers to discriminate in their hiring based on an employee’s religious faith. This particular issue received the most attention from lawmakers during the debate on the bill and was strongly opposed by the National Head Start Association.
Despite this very harmful provision, there were two primary victories for the Head Start community in the House bill. The first is that it does not include the very divisive block grant proposal incorporated into the House’s last reauthorization attempt. Secondly, an amendment by Representative Ron Kind (D-Wisc.) was added to the bill that will halt the National Reporting System until the National Academy of Sciences develops an appropriate instrument to assess children. The House bill contained additional positive provisions that NHSA supported such as increased outreach to homeless children; a bigger set-aside for Migrant, Seasonal and Indian Head Start programs; and a provision allowing Head Start programs to convert Head Start slots to Early Head Start slots. The legislation allows the Department of Health and Human Services to re-compete the grants of a small number of poorly performing programs but not all grantees as was first proposed by Republicans on the Education and Workforce Committee.
While there is a lot for Head Start programs to cheer about, the House bill was far from perfect. In particular, NHSA remains very concerned about two key issues:
- In the House bill at least half of all Head Start teachers must obtain their B.A. degrees by 2011, but the bill does not provide programs with any additional funds to help teachers be paid a fair wage.
- The House bill significantly weakens the policy council. While the current structure of Head Start requires programs to be administrated jointly through a board of directors and policy council, the House bill removes the authority of the policy council and reduces their role to that of an advisory group.
Reauthorization in the Senate
Now we await action in the Senate on their version of reauthorization legislation, S.1107, the “Head Start Improvements for School Readiness Act of 2005.” The bill was approved on May 25, 2005, by the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions (HELP) Committee and is due to be considered by the full Senate during the second session of the 109th Congress. As in the House bill, the Senate bill maintains the federal-to-local structure of Head Start and does not contain the proposal to block grant the program and it limits recompetition of grants to those Head Start programs that are poorly performing by having an “unresolved area of noncompliance.” Additional positive provisions included in the Senate bill and supported by NHSA are that it raises the income eligibility for Head Start from 100 to 130 percent of the poverty line so that more working families can participate in the program, and it provides a larger set aside for the Early Head Start program and for special populations such as Migrant and Seasonal Head Start programs and Indian Head Start programs.
NHSA has very real concerns, however, about some provisions in the Senate bill:
- Unfunded teacher degrees: Unlike the House bill, which required half of all Head Start teachers to have a B.A. degree by 2011, the Senate bill requires half of the teachers in every center-based program to have at least a B.A. degree AND Head Start teachers must meet the higher degrees of their state pre-k requirements. Yet, the Senate bill includes no funds to accomplish these requirements. While the Senate Committee report language states that teacher requirements will not be the subject of penalties or sanctions, we continue to be concerned that this language is not included in the bill.
- Weakens parent policy councils: As approved by the HELP Committee, the bill would significantly weaken Head Start’s shared governance structure, removing authority from the parent policy council and affording it merely an advisory capacity.
- NRS: Unlike the House bill, the Senate bill does not include a provision to halt the NRS – the SAT-like test being given to Head Start children.
At this point, NHSA continues to work to see changes that address these concerns included in a “manager’s amendment” before the bill goes to the floor. If that doesn’t happen, we will work to get key amendments offered and accepted on the floor. However, the bill remains deadlocked right now due to a controversial discrimination amendment that the Republicans would like to offer on the Senate floor. This amendment would allow faith-based providers of Head Start to discriminate in their hiring practices on the basis of religion, similar to the amendment that was successfully added to the House bill. Without this issue being resolved, the Senate bill remains held up in the Senate HELP Committee for the foreseeable future.
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