The Trump administration is planning to overhaul Head Start by turning over most of its quality standards to state control and tightening requirements for parents who are homeless or unemployed, two people familiar with the deliberations said.
Word of the impending changes is raising anxiety for California advocates, providers and families who rely on the early education program and are concerned about future access to disadvantaged children.
Head Start, which is federally funded and serves low-income children, was established in the 1960s to help fight poverty and has long been considered by early childhood education experts to be a gold standard early learning program. California receives $1.5 billion annually in federal Head Start funding, serving 84,000 children across the state.
Its regulations, which stretch more than 100 pages, outline requirements on everything from child-to-teacher ratios and child health screenings to family engagement. The planned changes would replace those regulations with around a dozen pages of rules, leaving most of the specifics up to state and local law, said the people familiar with the deliberations, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss information that was not yet public and because they feared reprisal.
The Department of Health and Human Services, which oversees Head Start, said on social media to expect a rule to be published this week, adding that the changes will reinforce Head Start’s mission while cutting “unnecessary red tape.”
The draft rules would require more documentation from parents who are homeless or unemployed, the people familiar with the deliberations told the Associated Press. An early version of the proposal also would have barred parents who are in the United States illegally from enrolling their children, even if the children are U.S. citizens. It’s unclear whether those provisions will make the final draft.
Word of the potential overhaul — which must undergo a public comment period before becoming final — has been spreading throughout the state for weeks, fomenting worries among advocates, providers and families bracing for changes to a child-care program that is critical for struggling families.
The state’s direction on child care as a whole largely will depend on who becomes the next governor, which could now also impact Head Start, said Melanee Cottrill, executive director of Head Start California.
The next governor will take the helm after Gov. Gavin Newsom prioritized learning for children under 5 by expanding transitional kindergarten to all 4-year-olds and opening more subsidized child-care spaces.
Donna Sneeringer, the president of the Child Care Resource Center, an L.A. County nonprofit that contracts with Head Start, expects child-to-teacher ratios to default to those already outlined for state preschool and general child care — if that guidance is left up to the state. The ratios outlined for those programs are similar to if not stricter than Head Start regulations.
“Our state standards are strong,” Sneeringer said. “It would be in other states where that would be a bigger issue. So I think it would hit differently across the country.”
But the major issue in California likely will be access. The ongoing confusion and uncertainty is a deterrent for families, Cottrill said. And any additional documentation would be another barrier to access in a state where less than half of children under 5 had regular child care arrangements in 2023.
“We could see that being potentially challenging, not just for immigrant families, but for all families,” she said. “If your family is homeless and sleeping in your car, you’re not really focused on ‘where’s my birth certificate, where’s my documentation.’”
Head Start’s rules target poverty, experts say
Head Start serves more than half a million low-income babies, toddlers and preschoolers nationwide. For families that qualify, it offers free preschool and screenings to identify developmental delays. It also offers supports for families.
Across Los Angeles County, 505 Head Start centers serve nearly 15,000 children.
The changes to Head Start would deliver a win for conservatives who have sought wholesale elimination of it. Conservative think tanks such as the Heritage Foundation and the Cato Institute have called the program ineffective, unsafe and a poor use of public funds.
Still, support for Head Start remains largely bipartisan, particularly in California, where state legislators wrote a letter to California’s congressional delegation in its favor last year, in what Assemblymember Patrick Ahrens (D-Sunnyvale) called “probably the most bipartisan letter and issue that we have worked on in years.”
If the changes take effect, they could make Head Start unrecognizable, said Khari Garvin, who ran the Office of Head Start under President Biden.
“We’d have the carcass of Head Start,” Garvin said. “You might have a program that’s called Head Start, but in substance it will not be.”
The proposed rules originally were reported in The Bulwark. The White House, the Office of Management and Budget and the Department of Health and Human Services, which oversees Head Start, did not respond to questions.
Tommy Sheridan, deputy director of the National Head Start Assn., said the organization has yet to see the proposed rules. But he said the potential for a massive overhaul has left the organization on edge.
“We’re very anxious,” Sheridan said. “When it does come out … we’ll be ready to fight back where we need to fight back.”
Still, he emphasized that Head Start centers might not be impacted for months. Once the proposal is made public, federal law requires the administration to give at least a month for the public to weigh in on it. Then, once finalized, it may take more time for the rules to take effect. There’s also the potential for a lawsuit to halt implementation.
Created during War on Poverty
Head Start was created as part of President Lyndon B. Johnson’s War on Poverty and targets the myriad challenges that low-income households face. It serves children and adults alike, coaching parents on reaching their goals, connecting them with services and even employing them.
Head Start operators, which include school districts and nonprofit organizations, are required to provide medical, dental and vision screenings for children and to monitor them for developmental delays. There also are a curriculum framework and prohibitions on physical and emotional abuse of children.
Many of the features that make Head Start distinct from mainstream preschools are spelled out in 122 pages of performance standards. The Trump administration’s proposal would toss most of that rule book and replace it with a much shorter version that eliminates or loosens many requirements, the people familiar with the proposal said. But the proposal also calls for new regulations, such as requiring all instruction in English.
Head Start, which has enjoyed robust bipartisan support for decades, has faced several threats since President Trump took office last year. Project 2025, a conservative policy blueprint authored by the official who is now Trump’s budget chief, called for the federal government to get rid of the program altogether.
Balingit writes for the Associated Press. Sequeira is a Times staff writer. Associated Press writer Ali Swenson contributed to this story.
The Trump administration is planning to overhaul Head Start by turning over most of its quality standards to state control and tightening requirements for parents who are homeless or unemployed, two people familiar with the deliberations said.
Word of the impending changes is raising anxiety for California advocates, providers and families who rely on the early education program and are concerned about future access to disadvantaged children.
Head Start, which is federally funded and serves low-income children, was established in the 1960s to help fight poverty and has long been considered by early childhood education experts to be a gold standard early learning program. California receives $1.5 billion annually in federal Head Start funding, serving 84,000 children across the state.
Its regulations, which stretch more than 100 pages, outline requirements on everything from child-to-teacher ratios and child health screenings to family engagement. The planned changes would replace those regulations with around a dozen pages of rules, leaving most of the specifics up to state and local law, said the people familiar with the deliberations, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss information that was not yet public and because they feared reprisal.
The Department of Health and Human Services, which oversees Head Start, said on social media to expect a rule to be published this week, adding that the changes will reinforce Head Start’s mission while cutting “unnecessary red tape.”
The draft rules would require more documentation from parents who are homeless or unemployed, the people familiar with the deliberations told the Associated Press. An early version of the proposal also would have barred parents who are in the United States illegally from enrolling their children, even if the children are U.S. citizens. It’s unclear whether those provisions will make the final draft.
Word of the potential overhaul — which must undergo a public comment period before becoming final — has been spreading throughout the state for weeks, fomenting worries among advocates, providers and families bracing for changes to a child-care program that is critical for struggling families.
The state’s direction on child care as a whole largely will depend on who becomes the next governor, which could now also impact Head Start, said Melanee Cottrill, executive director of Head Start California.
The next governor will take the helm after Gov. Gavin Newsom prioritized learning for children under 5 by expanding transitional kindergarten to all 4-year-olds and opening more subsidized child-care spaces.
Donna Sneeringer, the president of the Child Care Resource Center, an L.A. County nonprofit that contracts with Head Start, expects child-to-teacher ratios to default to those already outlined for state preschool and general child care — if that guidance is left up to the state. The ratios outlined for those programs are similar to if not stricter than Head Start regulations.
“Our state standards are strong,” Sneeringer said. “It would be in other states where that would be a bigger issue. So I think it would hit differently across the country.”
But the major issue in California likely will be access. The ongoing confusion and uncertainty is a deterrent for families, Cottrill said. And any additional documentation would be another barrier to access in a state where less than half of children under 5 had regular child care arrangements in 2023.
“We could see that being potentially challenging, not just for immigrant families, but for all families,” she said. “If your family is homeless and sleeping in your car, you’re not really focused on ‘where’s my birth certificate, where’s my documentation.’”
Head Start’s rules target poverty, experts say
Head Start serves more than half a million low-income babies, toddlers and preschoolers nationwide. For families that qualify, it offers free preschool and screenings to identify developmental delays. It also offers supports for families.
Across Los Angeles County, 505 Head Start centers serve nearly 15,000 children.
The changes to Head Start would deliver a win for conservatives who have sought wholesale elimination of it. Conservative think tanks such as the Heritage Foundation and the Cato Institute have called the program ineffective, unsafe and a poor use of public funds.
Still, support for Head Start remains largely bipartisan, particularly in California, where state legislators wrote a letter to California’s congressional delegation in its favor last year, in what Assemblymember Patrick Ahrens (D-Sunnyvale) called “probably the most bipartisan letter and issue that we have worked on in years.”
If the changes take effect, they could make Head Start unrecognizable, said Khari Garvin, who ran the Office of Head Start under President Biden.
“We’d have the carcass of Head Start,” Garvin said. “You might have a program that’s called Head Start, but in substance it will not be.”
The proposed rules originally were reported in The Bulwark. The White House, the Office of Management and Budget and the Department of Health and Human Services, which oversees Head Start, did not respond to questions.
Tommy Sheridan, deputy director of the National Head Start Assn., said the organization has yet to see the proposed rules. But he said the potential for a massive overhaul has left the organization on edge.
“We’re very anxious,” Sheridan said. “When it does come out … we’ll be ready to fight back where we need to fight back.”
Still, he emphasized that Head Start centers might not be impacted for months. Once the proposal is made public, federal law requires the administration to give at least a month for the public to weigh in on it. Then, once finalized, it may take more time for the rules to take effect. There’s also the potential for a lawsuit to halt implementation.
Created during War on Poverty
Head Start was created as part of President Lyndon B. Johnson’s War on Poverty and targets the myriad challenges that low-income households face. It serves children and adults alike, coaching parents on reaching their goals, connecting them with services and even employing them.
Head Start operators, which include school districts and nonprofit organizations, are required to provide medical, dental and vision screenings for children and to monitor them for developmental delays. There also are a curriculum framework and prohibitions on physical and emotional abuse of children.
Many of the features that make Head Start distinct from mainstream preschools are spelled out in 122 pages of performance standards. The Trump administration’s proposal would toss most of that rule book and replace it with a much shorter version that eliminates or loosens many requirements, the people familiar with the proposal said. But the proposal also calls for new regulations, such as requiring all instruction in English.
Head Start, which has enjoyed robust bipartisan support for decades, has faced several threats since President Trump took office last year. Project 2025, a conservative policy blueprint authored by the official who is now Trump’s budget chief, called for the federal government to get rid of the program altogether.
Balingit writes for the Associated Press. Sequeira is a Times staff writer. Associated Press writer Ali Swenson contributed to this story.
The Trump administration is planning to overhaul Head Start by turning over most of its quality standards to state control and tightening requirements for parents who are homeless or unemployed, two people familiar with the deliberations said.
Word of the impending changes is raising anxiety for California advocates, providers and families who rely on the early education program and are concerned about future access to disadvantaged children.
Head Start, which is federally funded and serves low-income children, was established in the 1960s to help fight poverty and has long been considered by early childhood education experts to be a gold standard early learning program. California receives $1.5 billion annually in federal Head Start funding, serving 84,000 children across the state.
Its regulations, which stretch more than 100 pages, outline requirements on everything from child-to-teacher ratios and child health screenings to family engagement. The planned changes would replace those regulations with around a dozen pages of rules, leaving most of the specifics up to state and local law, said the people familiar with the deliberations, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss information that was not yet public and because they feared reprisal.
The Department of Health and Human Services, which oversees Head Start, said on social media to expect a rule to be published this week, adding that the changes will reinforce Head Start’s mission while cutting “unnecessary red tape.”
The draft rules would require more documentation from parents who are homeless or unemployed, the people familiar with the deliberations told the Associated Press. An early version of the proposal also would have barred parents who are in the United States illegally from enrolling their children, even if the children are U.S. citizens. It’s unclear whether those provisions will make the final draft.
Word of the potential overhaul — which must undergo a public comment period before becoming final — has been spreading throughout the state for weeks, fomenting worries among advocates, providers and families bracing for changes to a child-care program that is critical for struggling families.
The state’s direction on child care as a whole largely will depend on who becomes the next governor, which could now also impact Head Start, said Melanee Cottrill, executive director of Head Start California.
The next governor will take the helm after Gov. Gavin Newsom prioritized learning for children under 5 by expanding transitional kindergarten to all 4-year-olds and opening more subsidized child-care spaces.
Donna Sneeringer, the president of the Child Care Resource Center, an L.A. County nonprofit that contracts with Head Start, expects child-to-teacher ratios to default to those already outlined for state preschool and general child care — if that guidance is left up to the state. The ratios outlined for those programs are similar to if not stricter than Head Start regulations.
“Our state standards are strong,” Sneeringer said. “It would be in other states where that would be a bigger issue. So I think it would hit differently across the country.”
But the major issue in California likely will be access. The ongoing confusion and uncertainty is a deterrent for families, Cottrill said. And any additional documentation would be another barrier to access in a state where less than half of children under 5 had regular child care arrangements in 2023.
“We could see that being potentially challenging, not just for immigrant families, but for all families,” she said. “If your family is homeless and sleeping in your car, you’re not really focused on ‘where’s my birth certificate, where’s my documentation.’”
Head Start’s rules target poverty, experts say
Head Start serves more than half a million low-income babies, toddlers and preschoolers nationwide. For families that qualify, it offers free preschool and screenings to identify developmental delays. It also offers supports for families.
Across Los Angeles County, 505 Head Start centers serve nearly 15,000 children.
The changes to Head Start would deliver a win for conservatives who have sought wholesale elimination of it. Conservative think tanks such as the Heritage Foundation and the Cato Institute have called the program ineffective, unsafe and a poor use of public funds.
Still, support for Head Start remains largely bipartisan, particularly in California, where state legislators wrote a letter to California’s congressional delegation in its favor last year, in what Assemblymember Patrick Ahrens (D-Sunnyvale) called “probably the most bipartisan letter and issue that we have worked on in years.”
If the changes take effect, they could make Head Start unrecognizable, said Khari Garvin, who ran the Office of Head Start under President Biden.
“We’d have the carcass of Head Start,” Garvin said. “You might have a program that’s called Head Start, but in substance it will not be.”
The proposed rules originally were reported in The Bulwark. The White House, the Office of Management and Budget and the Department of Health and Human Services, which oversees Head Start, did not respond to questions.
Tommy Sheridan, deputy director of the National Head Start Assn., said the organization has yet to see the proposed rules. But he said the potential for a massive overhaul has left the organization on edge.
“We’re very anxious,” Sheridan said. “When it does come out … we’ll be ready to fight back where we need to fight back.”
Still, he emphasized that Head Start centers might not be impacted for months. Once the proposal is made public, federal law requires the administration to give at least a month for the public to weigh in on it. Then, once finalized, it may take more time for the rules to take effect. There’s also the potential for a lawsuit to halt implementation.
Created during War on Poverty
Head Start was created as part of President Lyndon B. Johnson’s War on Poverty and targets the myriad challenges that low-income households face. It serves children and adults alike, coaching parents on reaching their goals, connecting them with services and even employing them.
Head Start operators, which include school districts and nonprofit organizations, are required to provide medical, dental and vision screenings for children and to monitor them for developmental delays. There also are a curriculum framework and prohibitions on physical and emotional abuse of children.
Many of the features that make Head Start distinct from mainstream preschools are spelled out in 122 pages of performance standards. The Trump administration’s proposal would toss most of that rule book and replace it with a much shorter version that eliminates or loosens many requirements, the people familiar with the proposal said. But the proposal also calls for new regulations, such as requiring all instruction in English.
Head Start, which has enjoyed robust bipartisan support for decades, has faced several threats since President Trump took office last year. Project 2025, a conservative policy blueprint authored by the official who is now Trump’s budget chief, called for the federal government to get rid of the program altogether.
Balingit writes for the Associated Press. Sequeira is a Times staff writer. Associated Press writer Ali Swenson contributed to this story.
The Trump administration is planning to overhaul Head Start by turning over most of its quality standards to state control and tightening requirements for parents who are homeless or unemployed, two people familiar with the deliberations said.
Word of the impending changes is raising anxiety for California advocates, providers and families who rely on the early education program and are concerned about future access to disadvantaged children.
Head Start, which is federally funded and serves low-income children, was established in the 1960s to help fight poverty and has long been considered by early childhood education experts to be a gold standard early learning program. California receives $1.5 billion annually in federal Head Start funding, serving 84,000 children across the state.
Its regulations, which stretch more than 100 pages, outline requirements on everything from child-to-teacher ratios and child health screenings to family engagement. The planned changes would replace those regulations with around a dozen pages of rules, leaving most of the specifics up to state and local law, said the people familiar with the deliberations, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss information that was not yet public and because they feared reprisal.
The Department of Health and Human Services, which oversees Head Start, said on social media to expect a rule to be published this week, adding that the changes will reinforce Head Start’s mission while cutting “unnecessary red tape.”
The draft rules would require more documentation from parents who are homeless or unemployed, the people familiar with the deliberations told the Associated Press. An early version of the proposal also would have barred parents who are in the United States illegally from enrolling their children, even if the children are U.S. citizens. It’s unclear whether those provisions will make the final draft.
Word of the potential overhaul — which must undergo a public comment period before becoming final — has been spreading throughout the state for weeks, fomenting worries among advocates, providers and families bracing for changes to a child-care program that is critical for struggling families.
The state’s direction on child care as a whole largely will depend on who becomes the next governor, which could now also impact Head Start, said Melanee Cottrill, executive director of Head Start California.
The next governor will take the helm after Gov. Gavin Newsom prioritized learning for children under 5 by expanding transitional kindergarten to all 4-year-olds and opening more subsidized child-care spaces.
Donna Sneeringer, the president of the Child Care Resource Center, an L.A. County nonprofit that contracts with Head Start, expects child-to-teacher ratios to default to those already outlined for state preschool and general child care — if that guidance is left up to the state. The ratios outlined for those programs are similar to if not stricter than Head Start regulations.
“Our state standards are strong,” Sneeringer said. “It would be in other states where that would be a bigger issue. So I think it would hit differently across the country.”
But the major issue in California likely will be access. The ongoing confusion and uncertainty is a deterrent for families, Cottrill said. And any additional documentation would be another barrier to access in a state where less than half of children under 5 had regular child care arrangements in 2023.
“We could see that being potentially challenging, not just for immigrant families, but for all families,” she said. “If your family is homeless and sleeping in your car, you’re not really focused on ‘where’s my birth certificate, where’s my documentation.’”
Head Start’s rules target poverty, experts say
Head Start serves more than half a million low-income babies, toddlers and preschoolers nationwide. For families that qualify, it offers free preschool and screenings to identify developmental delays. It also offers supports for families.
Across Los Angeles County, 505 Head Start centers serve nearly 15,000 children.
The changes to Head Start would deliver a win for conservatives who have sought wholesale elimination of it. Conservative think tanks such as the Heritage Foundation and the Cato Institute have called the program ineffective, unsafe and a poor use of public funds.
Still, support for Head Start remains largely bipartisan, particularly in California, where state legislators wrote a letter to California’s congressional delegation in its favor last year, in what Assemblymember Patrick Ahrens (D-Sunnyvale) called “probably the most bipartisan letter and issue that we have worked on in years.”
If the changes take effect, they could make Head Start unrecognizable, said Khari Garvin, who ran the Office of Head Start under President Biden.
“We’d have the carcass of Head Start,” Garvin said. “You might have a program that’s called Head Start, but in substance it will not be.”
The proposed rules originally were reported in The Bulwark. The White House, the Office of Management and Budget and the Department of Health and Human Services, which oversees Head Start, did not respond to questions.
Tommy Sheridan, deputy director of the National Head Start Assn., said the organization has yet to see the proposed rules. But he said the potential for a massive overhaul has left the organization on edge.
“We’re very anxious,” Sheridan said. “When it does come out … we’ll be ready to fight back where we need to fight back.”
Still, he emphasized that Head Start centers might not be impacted for months. Once the proposal is made public, federal law requires the administration to give at least a month for the public to weigh in on it. Then, once finalized, it may take more time for the rules to take effect. There’s also the potential for a lawsuit to halt implementation.
Created during War on Poverty
Head Start was created as part of President Lyndon B. Johnson’s War on Poverty and targets the myriad challenges that low-income households face. It serves children and adults alike, coaching parents on reaching their goals, connecting them with services and even employing them.
Head Start operators, which include school districts and nonprofit organizations, are required to provide medical, dental and vision screenings for children and to monitor them for developmental delays. There also are a curriculum framework and prohibitions on physical and emotional abuse of children.
Many of the features that make Head Start distinct from mainstream preschools are spelled out in 122 pages of performance standards. The Trump administration’s proposal would toss most of that rule book and replace it with a much shorter version that eliminates or loosens many requirements, the people familiar with the proposal said. But the proposal also calls for new regulations, such as requiring all instruction in English.
Head Start, which has enjoyed robust bipartisan support for decades, has faced several threats since President Trump took office last year. Project 2025, a conservative policy blueprint authored by the official who is now Trump’s budget chief, called for the federal government to get rid of the program altogether.
Balingit writes for the Associated Press. Sequeira is a Times staff writer. Associated Press writer Ali Swenson contributed to this story.
The Trump administration is planning to overhaul Head Start by turning over most of its quality standards to state control and tightening requirements for parents who are homeless or unemployed, two people familiar with the deliberations said.
Word of the impending changes is raising anxiety for California advocates, providers and families who rely on the early education program and are concerned about future access to disadvantaged children.
Head Start, which is federally funded and serves low-income children, was established in the 1960s to help fight poverty and has long been considered by early childhood education experts to be a gold standard early learning program. California receives $1.5 billion annually in federal Head Start funding, serving 84,000 children across the state.
Its regulations, which stretch more than 100 pages, outline requirements on everything from child-to-teacher ratios and child health screenings to family engagement. The planned changes would replace those regulations with around a dozen pages of rules, leaving most of the specifics up to state and local law, said the people familiar with the deliberations, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss information that was not yet public and because they feared reprisal.
The Department of Health and Human Services, which oversees Head Start, said on social media to expect a rule to be published this week, adding that the changes will reinforce Head Start’s mission while cutting “unnecessary red tape.”
The draft rules would require more documentation from parents who are homeless or unemployed, the people familiar with the deliberations told the Associated Press. An early version of the proposal also would have barred parents who are in the United States illegally from enrolling their children, even if the children are U.S. citizens. It’s unclear whether those provisions will make the final draft.
Word of the potential overhaul — which must undergo a public comment period before becoming final — has been spreading throughout the state for weeks, fomenting worries among advocates, providers and families bracing for changes to a child-care program that is critical for struggling families.
The state’s direction on child care as a whole largely will depend on who becomes the next governor, which could now also impact Head Start, said Melanee Cottrill, executive director of Head Start California.
The next governor will take the helm after Gov. Gavin Newsom prioritized learning for children under 5 by expanding transitional kindergarten to all 4-year-olds and opening more subsidized child-care spaces.
Donna Sneeringer, the president of the Child Care Resource Center, an L.A. County nonprofit that contracts with Head Start, expects child-to-teacher ratios to default to those already outlined for state preschool and general child care — if that guidance is left up to the state. The ratios outlined for those programs are similar to if not stricter than Head Start regulations.
“Our state standards are strong,” Sneeringer said. “It would be in other states where that would be a bigger issue. So I think it would hit differently across the country.”
But the major issue in California likely will be access. The ongoing confusion and uncertainty is a deterrent for families, Cottrill said. And any additional documentation would be another barrier to access in a state where less than half of children under 5 had regular child care arrangements in 2023.
“We could see that being potentially challenging, not just for immigrant families, but for all families,” she said. “If your family is homeless and sleeping in your car, you’re not really focused on ‘where’s my birth certificate, where’s my documentation.’”
Head Start’s rules target poverty, experts say
Head Start serves more than half a million low-income babies, toddlers and preschoolers nationwide. For families that qualify, it offers free preschool and screenings to identify developmental delays. It also offers supports for families.
Across Los Angeles County, 505 Head Start centers serve nearly 15,000 children.
The changes to Head Start would deliver a win for conservatives who have sought wholesale elimination of it. Conservative think tanks such as the Heritage Foundation and the Cato Institute have called the program ineffective, unsafe and a poor use of public funds.
Still, support for Head Start remains largely bipartisan, particularly in California, where state legislators wrote a letter to California’s congressional delegation in its favor last year, in what Assemblymember Patrick Ahrens (D-Sunnyvale) called “probably the most bipartisan letter and issue that we have worked on in years.”
If the changes take effect, they could make Head Start unrecognizable, said Khari Garvin, who ran the Office of Head Start under President Biden.
“We’d have the carcass of Head Start,” Garvin said. “You might have a program that’s called Head Start, but in substance it will not be.”
The proposed rules originally were reported in The Bulwark. The White House, the Office of Management and Budget and the Department of Health and Human Services, which oversees Head Start, did not respond to questions.
Tommy Sheridan, deputy director of the National Head Start Assn., said the organization has yet to see the proposed rules. But he said the potential for a massive overhaul has left the organization on edge.
“We’re very anxious,” Sheridan said. “When it does come out … we’ll be ready to fight back where we need to fight back.”
Still, he emphasized that Head Start centers might not be impacted for months. Once the proposal is made public, federal law requires the administration to give at least a month for the public to weigh in on it. Then, once finalized, it may take more time for the rules to take effect. There’s also the potential for a lawsuit to halt implementation.
Created during War on Poverty
Head Start was created as part of President Lyndon B. Johnson’s War on Poverty and targets the myriad challenges that low-income households face. It serves children and adults alike, coaching parents on reaching their goals, connecting them with services and even employing them.
Head Start operators, which include school districts and nonprofit organizations, are required to provide medical, dental and vision screenings for children and to monitor them for developmental delays. There also are a curriculum framework and prohibitions on physical and emotional abuse of children.
Many of the features that make Head Start distinct from mainstream preschools are spelled out in 122 pages of performance standards. The Trump administration’s proposal would toss most of that rule book and replace it with a much shorter version that eliminates or loosens many requirements, the people familiar with the proposal said. But the proposal also calls for new regulations, such as requiring all instruction in English.
Head Start, which has enjoyed robust bipartisan support for decades, has faced several threats since President Trump took office last year. Project 2025, a conservative policy blueprint authored by the official who is now Trump’s budget chief, called for the federal government to get rid of the program altogether.
Balingit writes for the Associated Press. Sequeira is a Times staff writer. Associated Press writer Ali Swenson contributed to this story.
The Trump administration is planning to overhaul Head Start by turning over most of its quality standards to state control and tightening requirements for parents who are homeless or unemployed, two people familiar with the deliberations said.
Word of the impending changes is raising anxiety for California advocates, providers and families who rely on the early education program and are concerned about future access to disadvantaged children.
Head Start, which is federally funded and serves low-income children, was established in the 1960s to help fight poverty and has long been considered by early childhood education experts to be a gold standard early learning program. California receives $1.5 billion annually in federal Head Start funding, serving 84,000 children across the state.
Its regulations, which stretch more than 100 pages, outline requirements on everything from child-to-teacher ratios and child health screenings to family engagement. The planned changes would replace those regulations with around a dozen pages of rules, leaving most of the specifics up to state and local law, said the people familiar with the deliberations, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss information that was not yet public and because they feared reprisal.
The Department of Health and Human Services, which oversees Head Start, said on social media to expect a rule to be published this week, adding that the changes will reinforce Head Start’s mission while cutting “unnecessary red tape.”
The draft rules would require more documentation from parents who are homeless or unemployed, the people familiar with the deliberations told the Associated Press. An early version of the proposal also would have barred parents who are in the United States illegally from enrolling their children, even if the children are U.S. citizens. It’s unclear whether those provisions will make the final draft.
Word of the potential overhaul — which must undergo a public comment period before becoming final — has been spreading throughout the state for weeks, fomenting worries among advocates, providers and families bracing for changes to a child-care program that is critical for struggling families.
The state’s direction on child care as a whole largely will depend on who becomes the next governor, which could now also impact Head Start, said Melanee Cottrill, executive director of Head Start California.
The next governor will take the helm after Gov. Gavin Newsom prioritized learning for children under 5 by expanding transitional kindergarten to all 4-year-olds and opening more subsidized child-care spaces.
Donna Sneeringer, the president of the Child Care Resource Center, an L.A. County nonprofit that contracts with Head Start, expects child-to-teacher ratios to default to those already outlined for state preschool and general child care — if that guidance is left up to the state. The ratios outlined for those programs are similar to if not stricter than Head Start regulations.
“Our state standards are strong,” Sneeringer said. “It would be in other states where that would be a bigger issue. So I think it would hit differently across the country.”
But the major issue in California likely will be access. The ongoing confusion and uncertainty is a deterrent for families, Cottrill said. And any additional documentation would be another barrier to access in a state where less than half of children under 5 had regular child care arrangements in 2023.
“We could see that being potentially challenging, not just for immigrant families, but for all families,” she said. “If your family is homeless and sleeping in your car, you’re not really focused on ‘where’s my birth certificate, where’s my documentation.’”
Head Start’s rules target poverty, experts say
Head Start serves more than half a million low-income babies, toddlers and preschoolers nationwide. For families that qualify, it offers free preschool and screenings to identify developmental delays. It also offers supports for families.
Across Los Angeles County, 505 Head Start centers serve nearly 15,000 children.
The changes to Head Start would deliver a win for conservatives who have sought wholesale elimination of it. Conservative think tanks such as the Heritage Foundation and the Cato Institute have called the program ineffective, unsafe and a poor use of public funds.
Still, support for Head Start remains largely bipartisan, particularly in California, where state legislators wrote a letter to California’s congressional delegation in its favor last year, in what Assemblymember Patrick Ahrens (D-Sunnyvale) called “probably the most bipartisan letter and issue that we have worked on in years.”
If the changes take effect, they could make Head Start unrecognizable, said Khari Garvin, who ran the Office of Head Start under President Biden.
“We’d have the carcass of Head Start,” Garvin said. “You might have a program that’s called Head Start, but in substance it will not be.”
The proposed rules originally were reported in The Bulwark. The White House, the Office of Management and Budget and the Department of Health and Human Services, which oversees Head Start, did not respond to questions.
Tommy Sheridan, deputy director of the National Head Start Assn., said the organization has yet to see the proposed rules. But he said the potential for a massive overhaul has left the organization on edge.
“We’re very anxious,” Sheridan said. “When it does come out … we’ll be ready to fight back where we need to fight back.”
Still, he emphasized that Head Start centers might not be impacted for months. Once the proposal is made public, federal law requires the administration to give at least a month for the public to weigh in on it. Then, once finalized, it may take more time for the rules to take effect. There’s also the potential for a lawsuit to halt implementation.
Created during War on Poverty
Head Start was created as part of President Lyndon B. Johnson’s War on Poverty and targets the myriad challenges that low-income households face. It serves children and adults alike, coaching parents on reaching their goals, connecting them with services and even employing them.
Head Start operators, which include school districts and nonprofit organizations, are required to provide medical, dental and vision screenings for children and to monitor them for developmental delays. There also are a curriculum framework and prohibitions on physical and emotional abuse of children.
Many of the features that make Head Start distinct from mainstream preschools are spelled out in 122 pages of performance standards. The Trump administration’s proposal would toss most of that rule book and replace it with a much shorter version that eliminates or loosens many requirements, the people familiar with the proposal said. But the proposal also calls for new regulations, such as requiring all instruction in English.
Head Start, which has enjoyed robust bipartisan support for decades, has faced several threats since President Trump took office last year. Project 2025, a conservative policy blueprint authored by the official who is now Trump’s budget chief, called for the federal government to get rid of the program altogether.
Balingit writes for the Associated Press. Sequeira is a Times staff writer. Associated Press writer Ali Swenson contributed to this story.
The Trump administration is planning to overhaul Head Start by turning over most of its quality standards to state control and tightening requirements for parents who are homeless or unemployed, two people familiar with the deliberations said.
Word of the impending changes is raising anxiety for California advocates, providers and families who rely on the early education program and are concerned about future access to disadvantaged children.
Head Start, which is federally funded and serves low-income children, was established in the 1960s to help fight poverty and has long been considered by early childhood education experts to be a gold standard early learning program. California receives $1.5 billion annually in federal Head Start funding, serving 84,000 children across the state.
Its regulations, which stretch more than 100 pages, outline requirements on everything from child-to-teacher ratios and child health screenings to family engagement. The planned changes would replace those regulations with around a dozen pages of rules, leaving most of the specifics up to state and local law, said the people familiar with the deliberations, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss information that was not yet public and because they feared reprisal.
The Department of Health and Human Services, which oversees Head Start, said on social media to expect a rule to be published this week, adding that the changes will reinforce Head Start’s mission while cutting “unnecessary red tape.”
The draft rules would require more documentation from parents who are homeless or unemployed, the people familiar with the deliberations told the Associated Press. An early version of the proposal also would have barred parents who are in the United States illegally from enrolling their children, even if the children are U.S. citizens. It’s unclear whether those provisions will make the final draft.
Word of the potential overhaul — which must undergo a public comment period before becoming final — has been spreading throughout the state for weeks, fomenting worries among advocates, providers and families bracing for changes to a child-care program that is critical for struggling families.
The state’s direction on child care as a whole largely will depend on who becomes the next governor, which could now also impact Head Start, said Melanee Cottrill, executive director of Head Start California.
The next governor will take the helm after Gov. Gavin Newsom prioritized learning for children under 5 by expanding transitional kindergarten to all 4-year-olds and opening more subsidized child-care spaces.
Donna Sneeringer, the president of the Child Care Resource Center, an L.A. County nonprofit that contracts with Head Start, expects child-to-teacher ratios to default to those already outlined for state preschool and general child care — if that guidance is left up to the state. The ratios outlined for those programs are similar to if not stricter than Head Start regulations.
“Our state standards are strong,” Sneeringer said. “It would be in other states where that would be a bigger issue. So I think it would hit differently across the country.”
But the major issue in California likely will be access. The ongoing confusion and uncertainty is a deterrent for families, Cottrill said. And any additional documentation would be another barrier to access in a state where less than half of children under 5 had regular child care arrangements in 2023.
“We could see that being potentially challenging, not just for immigrant families, but for all families,” she said. “If your family is homeless and sleeping in your car, you’re not really focused on ‘where’s my birth certificate, where’s my documentation.’”
Head Start’s rules target poverty, experts say
Head Start serves more than half a million low-income babies, toddlers and preschoolers nationwide. For families that qualify, it offers free preschool and screenings to identify developmental delays. It also offers supports for families.
Across Los Angeles County, 505 Head Start centers serve nearly 15,000 children.
The changes to Head Start would deliver a win for conservatives who have sought wholesale elimination of it. Conservative think tanks such as the Heritage Foundation and the Cato Institute have called the program ineffective, unsafe and a poor use of public funds.
Still, support for Head Start remains largely bipartisan, particularly in California, where state legislators wrote a letter to California’s congressional delegation in its favor last year, in what Assemblymember Patrick Ahrens (D-Sunnyvale) called “probably the most bipartisan letter and issue that we have worked on in years.”
If the changes take effect, they could make Head Start unrecognizable, said Khari Garvin, who ran the Office of Head Start under President Biden.
“We’d have the carcass of Head Start,” Garvin said. “You might have a program that’s called Head Start, but in substance it will not be.”
The proposed rules originally were reported in The Bulwark. The White House, the Office of Management and Budget and the Department of Health and Human Services, which oversees Head Start, did not respond to questions.
Tommy Sheridan, deputy director of the National Head Start Assn., said the organization has yet to see the proposed rules. But he said the potential for a massive overhaul has left the organization on edge.
“We’re very anxious,” Sheridan said. “When it does come out … we’ll be ready to fight back where we need to fight back.”
Still, he emphasized that Head Start centers might not be impacted for months. Once the proposal is made public, federal law requires the administration to give at least a month for the public to weigh in on it. Then, once finalized, it may take more time for the rules to take effect. There’s also the potential for a lawsuit to halt implementation.
Created during War on Poverty
Head Start was created as part of President Lyndon B. Johnson’s War on Poverty and targets the myriad challenges that low-income households face. It serves children and adults alike, coaching parents on reaching their goals, connecting them with services and even employing them.
Head Start operators, which include school districts and nonprofit organizations, are required to provide medical, dental and vision screenings for children and to monitor them for developmental delays. There also are a curriculum framework and prohibitions on physical and emotional abuse of children.
Many of the features that make Head Start distinct from mainstream preschools are spelled out in 122 pages of performance standards. The Trump administration’s proposal would toss most of that rule book and replace it with a much shorter version that eliminates or loosens many requirements, the people familiar with the proposal said. But the proposal also calls for new regulations, such as requiring all instruction in English.
Head Start, which has enjoyed robust bipartisan support for decades, has faced several threats since President Trump took office last year. Project 2025, a conservative policy blueprint authored by the official who is now Trump’s budget chief, called for the federal government to get rid of the program altogether.
Balingit writes for the Associated Press. Sequeira is a Times staff writer. Associated Press writer Ali Swenson contributed to this story.
The Trump administration is planning to overhaul Head Start by turning over most of its quality standards to state control and tightening requirements for parents who are homeless or unemployed, two people familiar with the deliberations said.
Word of the impending changes is raising anxiety for California advocates, providers and families who rely on the early education program and are concerned about future access to disadvantaged children.
Head Start, which is federally funded and serves low-income children, was established in the 1960s to help fight poverty and has long been considered by early childhood education experts to be a gold standard early learning program. California receives $1.5 billion annually in federal Head Start funding, serving 84,000 children across the state.
Its regulations, which stretch more than 100 pages, outline requirements on everything from child-to-teacher ratios and child health screenings to family engagement. The planned changes would replace those regulations with around a dozen pages of rules, leaving most of the specifics up to state and local law, said the people familiar with the deliberations, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss information that was not yet public and because they feared reprisal.
The Department of Health and Human Services, which oversees Head Start, said on social media to expect a rule to be published this week, adding that the changes will reinforce Head Start’s mission while cutting “unnecessary red tape.”
The draft rules would require more documentation from parents who are homeless or unemployed, the people familiar with the deliberations told the Associated Press. An early version of the proposal also would have barred parents who are in the United States illegally from enrolling their children, even if the children are U.S. citizens. It’s unclear whether those provisions will make the final draft.
Word of the potential overhaul — which must undergo a public comment period before becoming final — has been spreading throughout the state for weeks, fomenting worries among advocates, providers and families bracing for changes to a child-care program that is critical for struggling families.
The state’s direction on child care as a whole largely will depend on who becomes the next governor, which could now also impact Head Start, said Melanee Cottrill, executive director of Head Start California.
The next governor will take the helm after Gov. Gavin Newsom prioritized learning for children under 5 by expanding transitional kindergarten to all 4-year-olds and opening more subsidized child-care spaces.
Donna Sneeringer, the president of the Child Care Resource Center, an L.A. County nonprofit that contracts with Head Start, expects child-to-teacher ratios to default to those already outlined for state preschool and general child care — if that guidance is left up to the state. The ratios outlined for those programs are similar to if not stricter than Head Start regulations.
“Our state standards are strong,” Sneeringer said. “It would be in other states where that would be a bigger issue. So I think it would hit differently across the country.”
But the major issue in California likely will be access. The ongoing confusion and uncertainty is a deterrent for families, Cottrill said. And any additional documentation would be another barrier to access in a state where less than half of children under 5 had regular child care arrangements in 2023.
“We could see that being potentially challenging, not just for immigrant families, but for all families,” she said. “If your family is homeless and sleeping in your car, you’re not really focused on ‘where’s my birth certificate, where’s my documentation.’”
Head Start’s rules target poverty, experts say
Head Start serves more than half a million low-income babies, toddlers and preschoolers nationwide. For families that qualify, it offers free preschool and screenings to identify developmental delays. It also offers supports for families.
Across Los Angeles County, 505 Head Start centers serve nearly 15,000 children.
The changes to Head Start would deliver a win for conservatives who have sought wholesale elimination of it. Conservative think tanks such as the Heritage Foundation and the Cato Institute have called the program ineffective, unsafe and a poor use of public funds.
Still, support for Head Start remains largely bipartisan, particularly in California, where state legislators wrote a letter to California’s congressional delegation in its favor last year, in what Assemblymember Patrick Ahrens (D-Sunnyvale) called “probably the most bipartisan letter and issue that we have worked on in years.”
If the changes take effect, they could make Head Start unrecognizable, said Khari Garvin, who ran the Office of Head Start under President Biden.
“We’d have the carcass of Head Start,” Garvin said. “You might have a program that’s called Head Start, but in substance it will not be.”
The proposed rules originally were reported in The Bulwark. The White House, the Office of Management and Budget and the Department of Health and Human Services, which oversees Head Start, did not respond to questions.
Tommy Sheridan, deputy director of the National Head Start Assn., said the organization has yet to see the proposed rules. But he said the potential for a massive overhaul has left the organization on edge.
“We’re very anxious,” Sheridan said. “When it does come out … we’ll be ready to fight back where we need to fight back.”
Still, he emphasized that Head Start centers might not be impacted for months. Once the proposal is made public, federal law requires the administration to give at least a month for the public to weigh in on it. Then, once finalized, it may take more time for the rules to take effect. There’s also the potential for a lawsuit to halt implementation.
Created during War on Poverty
Head Start was created as part of President Lyndon B. Johnson’s War on Poverty and targets the myriad challenges that low-income households face. It serves children and adults alike, coaching parents on reaching their goals, connecting them with services and even employing them.
Head Start operators, which include school districts and nonprofit organizations, are required to provide medical, dental and vision screenings for children and to monitor them for developmental delays. There also are a curriculum framework and prohibitions on physical and emotional abuse of children.
Many of the features that make Head Start distinct from mainstream preschools are spelled out in 122 pages of performance standards. The Trump administration’s proposal would toss most of that rule book and replace it with a much shorter version that eliminates or loosens many requirements, the people familiar with the proposal said. But the proposal also calls for new regulations, such as requiring all instruction in English.
Head Start, which has enjoyed robust bipartisan support for decades, has faced several threats since President Trump took office last year. Project 2025, a conservative policy blueprint authored by the official who is now Trump’s budget chief, called for the federal government to get rid of the program altogether.
Balingit writes for the Associated Press. Sequeira is a Times staff writer. Associated Press writer Ali Swenson contributed to this story.
