This article presents the goals and objectives of the Home Start Program, a description of the program, evaluation results, dissemination and replication outcomes, and results of a longitudinal research study of Home Start. The article concludes with implications for family policy as inferred from findings regarding Home Start. (DB)

Discusses features of the National Literacy Act that are of interest to librarians. Highlights include a new definition of literacy; cooperation between providers and government agencies; new programs, including state resource centers, national workforce strategies, services for prisoners, and family programs; amendments to existing legislation;…

Suggests that children, as the nation's most precious social resource, are the shared responsibility of parents and government. Argues that current efforts to scale back social welfare programs in Canada need to be reversed, so as to provide children, and families with children, a decent minimum standard of living. (MDM)

This study of individualized family service plans (IFSPs) addresses two questions. First, do IFSPs include family-centered assessment and outcome data (an indicator that the practices established by the legislation are taking place)? Second, does the family-centered data recorded in the IFSP vary with the presence or absence of a school social…

Early Head Start is a comprehensive, two-generation federal initiative begun in 1995 aimed at enhancing the development of infants and toddlers while strengthening low-income families. This report contains information from the Survey of Early Head Start Programs. Beyond the need for an updated picture of the Early Head Start program, the Survey of…

At the request of Congress, the U.S. General Accounting Office (GAO) examined federally funded early childhood programs to determine: (1) the total number of programs in fiscal years (FY) 1992 and 1993 providing education or child care to children from birth through age 5; (2) the 1992 budget authority for key programs; (3) the number of children…

This report updates and expands two earlier editions which describe Federal programs which affect children and their families. An introductory section discusses and presents tables of data concerning target groups and participation in the programs; program administration; and program funding. The bulk of the report consists of profiles of…

This discussion of the economic, social, health, and educational crisis facing African-American children is based on 20 years of statistical data and the history of U.S. legislative programs for the benefit of children in this century. It is noted that children in general are not valued in the United States, and that African-American children in…

This guide is designed to help local elected officials become better intergovernmental advocates for their city's children and families. The book is based on the experiences of selected policy researchers, collected via a questionnaire sent to some 50 local officials. It advocates developing and using intergovernmental collaboration and…

This booklet discusses the origins and components of Head Start, a federal project launched in 1965 to help break the cycle of poverty by providing preschool children of low-income families with a comprehensive program to meet their emotional, social, health, nutritional, and psychological needs. The description of the program notes that in fiscal…

This volume, third in a series evaluating the Child and Family Resource Program (CFRP), provides an overview of the evaluation, documents the first 6 months of the study, and examines initial program impact on families. Chapter 1 briefly summarizes the design of the CFRP evaluation and addresses the issues of sample selection and attrition, data…

This paper describes the assessment procedures used by the Child and Family Resource Program (CFRP) to identify and address the needs of families and of individual family members. CFRP was developed as part of the Head Start Improvement and Innovation effort to provide individualized comprehensive developmental services to families with children…

Conducted to determine which, if any, variables tend to indicate potential success (operationally defined as completing the training program), an analysis examined pre-center characteristics and demographic variables of participants and attempted to apply that data to success in negotiating the Mountain Plains program, a residential, family-based…

This report contains summaries by representatives of major federal agencies of the ways in which their programs relate to children. Generally, each reporting agency provides a brief description of programs, information on authorizing legislation, appropriations and any recent program modifications as well as names of any programs that have been…

This publication describes the Child and Family Resource Program (CFRP), and offers detailed information on specific characteristics of each of the 11 demonstration programs throughout the United States. In the first section background information presents the concept behind CFRP, objectives are outlined and program operation and evaluation are…