Children With Disablilities in Head Start

"Head Start Program." The Wikipedia. February 10,2011. Web. February 13,2011

Kadot, Riyo, Bennett, Tess, Thomas,Dawn. "Early Head Start: Services for Children with Special Needs and Staff Training Needs." ERIC Educational Resources Information Center. Articles. 2000-11-00. Web. February 13, 2011

According to Wikipedia, Head Start was first created in 1965. Head Start was a summer program designed to teach low income children what they needed to know before they started kindergarten. It was determined that six weeks failed to make up for five years of poverty. The Head Start preschool program was established in 1981. The article, "Early Head Start..." states that Head Start was generally started because of The Welfare Reform Act, affordable child care became an urgent need. Also Head Start was primarily to enhance the children's physical, social, emotional and cognitive needs of impoverished children and their families.

"Early Head Start" states that a new federal regulation put in place, required Head Start to enroll 10% of disabled students. President Clinton signed the Individuals with Disabilities Act (IDEA) Amendment in 1997 and Final signing was in 1999. Both Head Start and Early Head Start were required to have at least 10% special needs children enrolled. They must also qualify as low income. To qualify as low income according to Wikipedia a family must be under 130% of federal poverty level. Also families experiencing emergency situations with higher income could qualify. The article "Early Head Start" says that a questionnaire was sent out to all the Head Start and Early Head Start centers. Questions related to demographics, census information, Training needs, adaptation needs and what challenges faced the centers. Also how to meet the needs of special needs children they were now required to enroll.

Questionnaire respondents listed many of their already enrolled students as special needs children. 31.8% of the children were categorized as "at risk". 37.7% of the children were mildly disabled and 28.1% of the children were moderately disabled. I am guessing that there were very few severely disabled children, such as Down Syndrome or Autism.

The Article "Early Head Start" also states that if Head Start served more children, then more support would be needed. I am assuming that means more federal funding would be needed with the support. Also the article "Early Head Start" asks "What would be the added responsibilities of staff when dealing with children with disabilities?" My question is what do they do with other children? They look at the child's individual needs and they meet them. Also, why use the word "dealing" in this article? It sounds like they do not want these children.

The Article "Early Head Start" points out that although several were meeting the federal regulations, several were not. Some centers hesitated to "put a label" on their students. And others misinterpreted the disability as not as severe as the children are. Many others did not understand the definition of "at risk". Staff qualification questions were raised and detailed information regarding the children with disabilities were presented. Also staff interpretations on the need for adaptation of the needs of the disabled children varied greatly. Further research is needed. This article sounds to me like, that when legislation was passed, it was very broad guidelines. And Head Start used the broad guidelines to fit the existing students into them to meet the requirements that the legislation required.