Head Start is highly skilled in involving families and the local communities in shared decision-making on behalf of each child. Head Start engages all their partners in dialogue on a regular basis in designing the best program to meet the unique needs of the child, family, and community. The result is an effective individualized program that addresses the child's strengths and evolving needs.

About the West Virginia Head Start Association…
The WVHSA is a professional organization whose members consist of 24 Head Start grantees from every county. The members are directors, staff and parent representatives for the 7,000+ Head Start families.

The West Virginia Head Start Association believes…
· West Virginia's strength is our ability to struggle with each other over issues and come to an acceptable resolution that will define cost effective quality, fairness of access for all children and families, and economy of effort to best support and educate our children birth to five in families choose this program for them.

· West Virginia's strength resides in its teachers who remain dedicated to the teaching task even when they could move out of the state for a higher paycheck.

· West Virginia's strength comes from local grass roots early childhood community groups who have effectively partnered over the last 10+ years creating early education models that share resources such as environments, tools, and well trained early childhood education teachers, family workers, services.

· West Virginia's strength comes from the local collaborative bodies that support a system of family involvement that relies upon their input to help guide decisions that affect their children and their families. Their involvement in the decision-making process strengthens all educational decision-making and helps ensure every child will be successful in school.

· West Virginia's strength is exemplified through every Head Start program. Head Start is the nation's largest early childhood education program whose mission is to educate low-income children toward the goal of social competence and school readiness. Head Start is unique in that it provides national standards that require every child and family receives a range of comprehensive educational, child development, health, and family and community partnership services

Governor Bob Wise, in his Priorities for West Virginia Children and Families, October 2001, states these paraphrased goals:

Children will be ready to succeed in school, possess marketable skills and have access to good jobs. They will achieve and maintain good physical and mental health.

To achieve these goals the Governor identifies the primary task of creating a seamless web of early care and education for young children throughout the state. The WVHSA believes this system of care and education must include all the partners and provide effective ways to strengthen families and support them in their efforts to nurture and support their children's physical and mental health in order to be successful in education. The whole system must help families prevent long-term developmental and mental health problems from occurring where possible. The system must be based upon proven, effective early childhood developmental prevention research and services and improved early intervention services for the child and the family.

Head Start, as an active player in local collaborative bodies, believes the plan for investing money in a system of care and education for all children MUST include Head Start as an active partner in development and implementation of any local plan based upon its experience and ongoing support from the federal government. This program can serve as the ongoing core of services for the most vulnerable children and families within the state.

Our Proposed Plan…
WVHSA supports the Educare model for deciding where gaps are in each community's system of care and education. It allows for filling gaps in each community in the system. However, because the legislation has not been approved, the system of funding the Educare system must now rely upon the school funding formula to expand the plan to serve preschool children. Is this the best way to expand capacity and improve outcomes for children?

We believe decision-makers need to resolve to pass final Educare legislation, which makes clear, no federal dollars will be supplanted by state dollars as we expand the number of opportunities for children to receive a preschool education. Further, critical comprehensive services to families as defined in Head Start must be a mandated part of the system. Following the rule that state money is the money of last resort, collaboration will be required to fully operate the comprehensive program. The four local mandated planners will be the Local School District, Head Start, Parent Representatives and Child Care. This plan must maximize all the dollars available in the community to serve all four-year-old children first. This plan must ensure that no federal dollars have been supplanted by state money.

Recommended Plan for Phase in of the West Virginia Comprehensive Infant, Toddler, Preschool System:

1. Expand home based program for pregnant mothers, children birth to three utilizing and expanding Early Head Start, MIHOW, Parents as Teachers, Right From the Start, and others which are funded by federal dollars and state dollars. This model for service delivery is the least expensive and most effective. Where infant/toddler child care is a recognized as a community need, the West Virginia Department of Health and Human Resources Child Care Division will support the expansion of these services.
2. Provide comprehensive center based preschool for all Head Start eligible children by federal expansion and then state funding.
3. Continue funding Educare and expand the number of sites by two each year and rebid the grant awards after three years following evaluation of child outcomes.
4. Provide collaborative universal preschool for all four year olds throughout the state that are voluntary and designed through local child development collaborative bodies. Comprehensive services must be provided through a cost sharing process utilizing federal block grant and other funds first. Utilize the school funding formula as a last resort.

This plan maximizes dollars to serve all four-year-old children. It does not supplant federal dollars with state dollars, thus extending the capacity to serve all four-year-old children. It does not jeopardize the $46,000,000 Head Start dollars already flowing into the state. The plan supports the Educare system of collaborative service delivery and ensures full community participation in the results of the plan. Educare, as does Head Start, calls for high quality child development standards to be followed so that the results of our efforts benefit and not damage these most vulnerable children at this young age. It supports providing comprehensive services to families through a collaborative services delivery system.

We propose reaching children at the most critical phase of their lives as well as the most vulnerable children first…low-income children.

We welcome the West Virginia Department of Education joining the effort to serve more preschool children and provide high quality education and comprehensive services to preschoolers. We encourage the State Superintendent to institute further discussion on how each county will reach its goal of educating preschoolers through a meaningful collaborative model. We are aware, however, that preschool child care licensing regulations, including child/adult ratios, transportation of young children regulations and curriculum and individualization best practices must be addressed and strategies identified as to how schools can meet these critical standards.

Another issue WVHSA is compelled to identify…
We believe children's assessment process, and curriculum choices must be developmentally appropriate if the children are to thrive. "Pushing down" curriculum requirements upon young children can and will do serious damage, as has been stated many times by the National Association for the Education of Young Children, Head Start research, and other professionals in the field.

Our Conclusion…
In conclusion, WVHSA has always participated as an equal partner with our counterparts in every community. We have sat at the table with representative from child care, health, social services, and preschool education arenas. We have shared services and costs. We recognize that children are best served when we all partner with families to meet the comprehensive needs of all families with children birth to five. We welcome this opportunity to dialogue on the best, most economical plan to nurture West Virginia's children.