Data Illustrates Head Start’s Life-Changing, Multi-Generational Impact
New research briefs explore the Head Start Advantage
Head Start partners with families on their paths to success, while supporting children’s development with a whole-child approach. The Head Start model results in a wide variety of positive outcomes for children and their families, which we refer to collectively as the Head Start Advantage. The Head Start Advantage is what makes this model more impactful than other early childhood programs, and we have the research to back it up!
Over the past two months, NHSA has featured 7 one-page resources, each detailing a different component of the Head Start Advantage. Along with the research citations and social media toolkit, these tools will help you communicate the Head Start Advantage with potential partners, new parents, and the public.
Here are seven different areas where Head Start is creating successful outcomes for children and families:
1. Success in School Readiness
What is school readiness? School readiness describes the level at which children possess the skills, knowledge, and attitudes necessary for success in school and life.
What’s the Head Start Advantage?
- Head Start children have enhanced physical health, improved social skills, and increased math, language, and literacy skills that better prepare them for kindergarten and school.
- Head Start parents are more engaged in supporting their children’s learning and success at home and in school.
2. Success in Social-Emotional Development
What does healthy social-emotional development look like? Social-emotional development refers to a child’s ability to create and sustain meaningful relationships and his or her ability to engage with his or her own emotions and the emotions of others.
What’s the Head Start Advantage?
- Head Start children are more prepared to participate in kindergarten classrooms. They show fewer behavioral problems, less hyperactivity, and less aggression.
- Head Start children are less likely to engage in criminal activities as young adults.
3. Success in Parent Advancement
Why a multi-generational approach? Family stability and well-being are strong contributors to a child’s outcomes in early childhood and throughout their lifetime.
What’s the Head Start Advantage?
- Head Start enhances parents’ education levels, employment statuses, and incomes.
- Head Start improves parents’ skills, reduces parental stress, and improves overall family stability and self-sufficiency.
4. Success in Child Welfare
Why focus on child welfare? Children who live in poverty are twice as likely as their affluent peers to have been exposed to three or more distressing and traumatic life events.
What’s the Head Start Advantage?
- Head Start children have lower rates of abuse and neglect and are less likely to be involved in the child welfare system.
- Head Start provides parenting training opportunities, improves parent involvement and parent-child relationships, and decreases parental distress.
- For children already involved in the child welfare system, Head Start enhances school readiness and social-emotional outcomes and decreases their subsequent child welfare encounters.
5. Success in Physical Health
How does physical health apply to early learning? Early brain development lays the foundation for cognitive, motor, and socio-emotional abilities throughout a child’s lifetime. Low-income families are at a higher risk for experiencing food and nutrition insufficiency.
What’s the Head Start Advantage?
- Head Start children have greater access to health care and improved physical health throughout their lifetime.
- Head Start children have healthier eating patterns, healthier BMIs, and are at lower risk of being obese or overweight.
6. Success for Dual Language Learners
Why focus on dual language learners? According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the number of children who speak a language other than English at home had increased to approximately 21.3% in 2017.
What’s the Head Start Advantage?
- Dual language learners (DLLs) in Head Start increased their English proficiency during their enrollment, and the effects of Head Start on receptive vocabulary were larger for DLLs than monolingual-English speakers.
- Head Start promotes DLL parents’ English language ability, their involvement with children’s language learning at home, and their partnership with their children’s schools.
7. Success in Early Head Start
Why focus on 0–3 years? Children experience dramatic expansion and change in brain development in their first three years.
What’s the Head Start Advantage?
- Early Head Start children perform better on a wide range of cognitive measures, have better social skills, and exhibit significantly fewer behavioral problems and incidents of aggression.
- Families in Early Head Start have more positive parent-child relationships, more stable and healthy home environments, and less involvement with the child welfare system.
Want to take a deeper dive? Check out the full resources and their accompanying research citations. Then, spread the word about the facts behind the Head Start Advantage using NHSA’s social media toolkit.
Questions or ideas for other research topics? Let us know at research@nhsa.org.
