Statement on Designation Renewal Rule
| FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE | Media Contact: | Sally Aman | |
| November 8, 2011 | 202-262-8003 | ||
| aman@a2pr.com | |||
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National Head Start Association Statement on
New Rule: Designation Renewal of Head Start Agencies
WASHINGTON, D.C. - Today, President Obama announced that the Administration will go forward with final regulations related to the recompetition of underperforming Head Start and Early Head Start agencies.
"This morning at Yeadon Regional Head Start in Pennsylvania, President Obama addressed the valuable work done by committed Head Start educators, families and communities across the country. Over the last five decades, more than 27 million children have been provided critical early childhood education services and a window of opportunity to develop and grow into healthy, productive members of society. These children have gone on to become teachers, doctors, lawyers, business-leaders, entrepreneurs, prize-winning poets, public servants, the Treasurer of the United States and this year's Grammy winner, Jazz artist Esperanza Spalding.
The Head Start community recognizes that providing high quality services is its primary goal and remains committed to innovation and excellence in the pursuit of quality. The Administration's pursuit of excellence ensures we can work together through thoughtful and forward-thinking reform measures, resulting in efficient service delivery and the highest quality standards.
We applaud the Administration's long standing support of Head Start and the open process it has embraced during the creation of a system of designation renewal for Head Start grantees. We also appreciate the Administration's thorough consideration of the more than 16,000 comments from the field and input from the National Head Start Association. We particularly recognize the attention to several concerns, including a proposed arbitrary recompetition quota which was removed in the final rule.
We look forward to working with the Administration to make sure that the implementation of the new rule for designation and competition is fair, transparent and accountable and that the best interests of children continue to be served.
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Yasmina Vinci, Executive Director of the National Head Start Association (www.nhsa.org) was the first Executive Director of the National Association of Child Care Resource & Referral Agencies (NACCRRA), has held leadership positions in local, state and national early childhood education organizations and is serving on a number of governing Boards of national and local organizations.