In one of their latest moves to undo the Progressive Era of New Deal and Great Society/War on Poverty legislation, the Trump Back to the Gilded Age Regime is, with the aid of Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s Health and Human Services Department, launching a deregulation push of the Lyndon Johnson era-created Head Start, an early education program that serves about 700,000 poor children around the nation.
In reporting by the New York Times, this move to essentially gut the popular federal pre-school institution:
“…Would remove most of Head Start’s 133 pages of federal requirements for math and literacy curricula, class sizes, medical screenings, and home visits. Even a requirement that children brush their teeth after meals would end.
Administration officials say the changes, apparently recommendations from the fringe Heritage Foundation, to Head Start’s performance standards will save money by lifting onerous requirements, serve more children by increasing class sizes, and give states and municipalities more control in how the program is run. Critics say the changes will gut the core components of a singular institution that has served 30 million young children with high classroom standards and more health and antipoverty services than most states provide.”
Another regulation being cut is the one that requires children to get dental exams.
It does, however, provide, according to Kennedy Jr.’s MAHA vision, new guidelines for nutrition and physical activity.
Increasing class sizes in preschools.
No dental exams.
Not exactly a winning strategy for early education and children’s health.
It should be noted that Mr. Kennedy was in the Oval Office yesterday championing Mr. Trump’s Executive Order yesterday that embraced Junior’s anti-vaccination conspiracy theories and called for the curtailing of children receiving them.
Not sure his guidance should be followed on Head Start.
Kennedy Jr, whose Uncle, Sargent Shriver, helped organize Lyndon Johnson’s War on Poverty, including the creation of Head Start, publicly recognized the need for Head Start and told journalists in reporting from Politico, “These are the poorest kids in our country. Ninety percent of them are at or below the poverty line. The program works.”
In a statement reported by the New York Times, he said:
“My uncle, Sarge Shriver, founded the program on a simple conviction: strong families, wholesome nutrition, and healthy childhood development can change the course of a child’s life. Today we are returning Head Start to those roots. We are removing unnecessary bureaucracy, strengthening nutrition and physical health, trusting parents and local communities, and opening Head Start to hundreds of thousands more children.”
If he were still alive, Mr. Shriver would probably not share his nephew’s enthusiasm for a Trumpian deregulation scheme launched by the fringe Heritage Foundation.
Reacting to the proposed changes to Head Start that still have to go through a two-month feedback process, Kyrstyn Paulat, Director of Early Learning and Education at the Children’s Action Alliance in Phoenix, provided the following statement to Blog for Arizona:
“Children’s Action Alliance is deeply concerned about the proposed federal deregulation of Head Start and the potential consequences for children and families in Arizona. The proposed changes would eliminate or significantly weaken many of the federal standards that have helped distinguish Head Start from a standard child care program. These standards include protections around classroom quality and staffing, health and developmental screenings, services for children with disabilities, family engagement, home visiting, and other wraparound supports. CAA supports efforts to reduce unnecessary administrative burdens; however, deregulation should not mean dismantling the quality standards, comprehensive services, and family partnerships that make Head Start so valuable and a gold standard for what early childhood programs should be.”
Assistant Democratic House Leader and Educator Nancy Gutierrez also commented to Blog for Arizona:
“Head Start is an extremely valuable program that is supported by data and educational research. We must do everything we can to ensure that it continues and expands. I believe this rhetoric from the Trump administration to take away the federal “control” will hurt the program. We’ve seen this in the dismantling of the Department of Education. We need federal guidance and support, period. I don’t trust anything that the current administration or their leaders say about education. Their ultimate goal is to destroy public education. This would be detrimental to our students, but it would also destroy our Democracy.”
Arizona Representative Greg Stanton posted:
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