[Congressional Bills 114th Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
[H. Res. 92 Introduced in House (IH)]

114th CONGRESS
  1st Session
H. RES. 92

       Commemorating the 50th anniversary of Project Head Start.


_______________________________________________________________________


                    IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

                            February 5, 2015

 Ms. Jackson Lee (for herself, Ms. DeLauro, Mr. Levin, Mr. McDermott, 
   Mr. Meeks, Ms. Loretta Sanchez of California, Ms. Bordallo, Mrs. 
   Kirkpatrick, Mr. Vela, Mr. Caardenas, Ms. Norton, Mr. Johnson of 
Georgia, Ms. Fudge, Mr. Hastings, Ms. Clarke of New York, Mr. Serrano, 
Mr. Cartwright, Mr. Bishop of Georgia, Mr. Van Hollen, Mr. Conyers, Mr. 
 Cohen, Ms. Brown of Florida, Mr. Rangel, Mr. Himes, Mr. Ellison, Ms. 
  Adams, Mrs. Beatty, Mr. Vargas, Mr. Danny K. Davis of Illinois, Mr. 
Engel, Ms. Wilson of Florida, Ms. Michelle Lujan Grisham of New Mexico, 
 Mr. Carson of Indiana, Ms. Titus, Mrs. Bustos, Mr. Sablan, Ms. Hahn, 
Mr. Grijalva, Ms. Plaskett, Ms. Sewell of Alabama, Ms. Schakowsky, Mr. 
 Costa, Mr. Fattah, Ms. Matsui, Mrs. Lowey, Mr. Crowley, Ms. McCollum, 
    Mr. Sires, Mr. Ryan of Ohio, Ms. Lee, Mrs. Watson Coleman, Ms. 
 Slaughter, Mr. Tonko, Mr. Perlmutter, Mr. Pascrell, Mr. Higgins, Mr. 
Nolan, Ms. Tsongas, Ms. Kaptur, Ms. Bass, Mr. Loebsack, Mr. Kilmer, Mr. 
 Thompson of Mississippi, Ms. Lofgren, Ms. Brownley of California, Mr. 
   Lieu of California, Mr. Richmond, Ms. Kelly of Illinois, and Mr. 
 Peters) submitted the following resolution; which was referred to the 
                Committee on Education and the Workforce

_______________________________________________________________________

                               RESOLUTION


 
       Commemorating the 50th anniversary of Project Head Start.

Whereas May 18, 2015, marks the 50th anniversary of Head Start, originally 
        established as Project Head Start which was one of the signal 
        achievements of the Great Society and one of the boldest initiatives 
        launched by the Nation in the War on Poverty;
Whereas the aim of Project Head Start, as launched in 1965 in the White House 
        Rose Garden by President Lyndon Baines Johnson, was bold in its scope 
        and design;
Whereas in announcing the opening of a new front in the War on Poverty with the 
        launch of Project Head Start, President Johnson stated that ``We set out 
        to make certain that poverty's children would not be forevermore 
        poverty's captives.'';
Whereas Project Head Start was conceived as an 8-week summer program designed to 
        provide preschool training not just to prepare 5- and 6-year-olds to 
        enter regular school the following September, but also to give nearly 
        half the preschool children living in poverty ``a head start on their 
        future'';
Whereas when launched in 1965 Project Head Start, administered by the Office of 
        Economic Opportunity and wonderfully and skillfully led by its Director, 
        Sargent Shriver, consisted of 2,500 projects covering 11,000 child 
        development centers and serving about 530,000 poor children in every 
        State of the Union;
Whereas Project Head Start was launched not as a mere demonstration project 
        limited to a handful of counties, but as a program national in scope 
        serving every city, suburb, and rural area in the United States because 
        President Johnson recognized that the bleak future waiting for children 
        trapped in poverty was not a phenomenon concentrated in the inner-cities 
        of the large urban cities of the North but could be found in every 
        region in every State in the Nation;
Whereas in addition to providing pre-school training to prepare poor children to 
        enter regular school and help put them on an even footing with their 
        classmates as they enter school, Project Head Start sought to help 
        children prepare for the challenges they will face in life and to combat 
        poverty's great weapons--hunger and malnutrition, illness and poor 
        health, ignorance, and cultural deprivation;
Whereas Project Head Start was from the start a national undertaking, utilizing 
        the services of 41,000 professionals, including teachers, doctors, 
        dentists, nurses, and nutritionists, employing more than 47,000 persons 
        who were assisted by more than 500,000 volunteers;
Whereas based on its initial 1965 success as a summer program, the following 
        year, Project Head Start was funded as a primarily part-day, 9-month 
        program, largely implemented through existing community action programs;
Whereas in 1969 the administration of the program was vested in the newly 
        created Office of Child Development in what was then the Department of 
        Health, Education, and Welfare, the predecessor of the Department of 
        Health and Human Services;
Whereas in 1975 Head Start was established by Public Law 93-644;
Whereas in subsequent years, Head Start programs would be expanded to serve 
        children with disabilities, Native Americans, and homeless children and 
        to provide bilingual and bi-cultural migrant and seasonal programs 
        serving 6,000 children in 21 States;
Whereas today Head Start programs serve nearly 1,000,000 poor children, 
        including 136,120 children with disabilities, 15,632 pregnant women, and 
        provide services to 771,840 families;
Whereas not only have Head Start programs been a great benefit to their direct 
        beneficiaries, they have also provided substantial economic and social 
        benefits to the Nation as a whole, yielding a rate of return on 
        investment (ROI) of 7-9 percent and the direct creation of 236,591 jobs 
        paying an average annual salary of about $31,000 for Head Start teachers 
        with baccalaureate degrees;
Whereas according to a report published in 2004, ``Fight Crime: Invest In 
        Kids'', Head Start programs benefit society at large by reducing crime 
        and its costs to crime victims because Head Start children are 
        significantly less likely to have been charged with a crime than their 
        siblings who did not participate in a Head Start program;
Whereas another societal benefit of Head Start programs is the improved health 
        of the children and families they serve, evidenced by mortality rates 
        for 5- to 9-year-old children that are 33 to 50 percent lower than the 
        rates for comparable children not enrolled in a Head Start program;
Whereas Head Start children are less likely to fall victim to childhood obesity, 
        and are at least 8 percent more likely to have had their immunizations, 
        than children who did not attend preschool;
Whereas Head Start children also are less likely to exhibit problem behavior, 
        and studies have found that parents who participated in Head Start 
        programs have greater quality of life satisfaction, increased confidence 
        in coping skills, and decreased feelings of anxiety, depression, and 
        sickness;
Whereas Head Start programs have been an unqualified success for the more than 
        31,000,000 children and parents they have served since the inception of 
        Project Head Start in 1965;
Whereas the record of the Head Start programs validates President Johnson's 
        assertion that Head Start was and is ``one of the most constructive, and 
        one of the most sensible, and also one of the most exciting programs 
        that this Nation has ever undertaken''; and
Whereas the reward reaped by the Nation for this bold action is the collective 
        service and contributions to the betterment of society made by the 
        31,000,000 children who have been served by Head Start programs over the 
        past 50 years: Now, therefore, be it
    Resolved, That the House of Representatives--
            (1) recognizes and honors the 50th anniversary of Project 
        Head Start;
            (2) applauds President Lyndon Baines Johnson, all persons 
        whose support and efforts led to the creation of Project Head 
        Start in 1965, and the Head Start record of success over the 
        ensuing half century; and
            (3) encourages all Americans to recognize and celebrate the 
        important historical milestone of the creation of Head Start.
                                 <all>