Head Start Program - History

History

Head Start began as part of President Lyndon Johnson's Great Society campaign. Its justification came from the President’s Council of Economic Advisors, whose staff advanced the concept of investment in education during the Kennedy and Johnson administrations. The Office of Economic Opportunity's Community Action Program launched Project Head Start as an eight-week summer program in 1965. The following year it was authorized by Congress as a year–round program. In 1968, Head Start began funding a program that would eventually be called Sesame Street, operated by the Carnegie Corporation Preschool Television project. Congress enacted the Head Start Act in 1981.

In 1969 Head Start was transferred to the Office of Child Development in the Department of Health, Education and Welfare (later the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS)) by the Nixon Administration. Today it is a program within the Administration for Children and Families (ACF) in the HHS. In FY 1994, the Early Head Start program was established to serve children from birth to three years of age reflecting evidence that these years are critical to children's development. Programs are administered locally by nonprofit organizations and local education agencies such as school systems.