[Congressional Record Volume 149, Number 54 (Thursday, April 3, 2003)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Pages E680-E681]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                 THE EVEN START QUALITY IMPROVEMENT ACT

                                 ______
                                 

                          HON. SUSAN A. DAVIS

                             of california

                    in the house of representatives

                        Thursday, April 3, 2003

  Mrs. DAVIS of California. Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to offer a bill 
today designed to assure that literacy training is available to those 
who work with some of our youngest and most

[[Page E681]]

vulnerable children, those who are part of the Even Start program.
  These children's families qualify for Even Start because they are low 
socioeconomic families who may also be English learners. Program 
liaisons work with the families from the children's infancy until they 
are in school. Even Start funds approximately 1,400 programs and serves 
approximately 50,000 families across the Nation.
  Without this existing William F. Goodling Even Start Family Literacy 
Program, these children would arrive for their first day of school 
without the literacy skills to compete at that starting line. They are 
unlikely ever to catch up, even if they are able to be served in the 
Head Start program before actually entering school, unless the adults 
who work with them in these critical early years learn literacy 
teaching skills and learn to value the role of education.
  Over 86 percent of parents in the Even Start program have not 
completed high school upon entering the program (compared with about 27 
percent of Head Start parents). Eighty percent of participants have a 
family income below $15,000 and over 40 percent have income below 
$6,000. This is clearly a high-needs population.
  What the program offers is both literacy-training classes for the 
children and family literacy programs for the parents. Children 
participating in Even Start are provided with age-appropriate 
educational services to ensure that they will achieve at a level 
similar to that of their age peers who come from socio-economically 
enriched backgrounds.
  Liaison advisors work with each family to promote strong literacy 
support experiences, to help parents learn ways they can develop their 
own English literacy skills, and to provide support groups for parents 
to share the challenges and skills of parenting.
  In developing their own literacy, adults in these family literacy 
programs tend to participate longer than those in regular adult 
education programs because they can link their literacy growth to that 
of their children. They not only see benefits in improved literacy 
skills but also reduced dependency on federal/state assistance programs 
and enhanced employment opportunities. Most importantly, they are 
empowered to be successful as their child's first and most important 
teacher.
  This bill will set aside funding to establish nationwide programs to 
assist in the training of program directors and facilitators in 
recently developed, research-based literacy training skills.
  President Bush has declared his support for helping parents, day-care 
centers, and preschools teach more learning skills to children before 
they get to kindergarten. Even Start provides just such a program for 
parents to develop the literacy skills that enable them to perform this 
task. Because of new legislation, particularly the new qualifications 
for personnel, performance objectives, and ``scientifically-based 
reading research'' requirements for instructional programs, local Even 
Start programs also need to benefit from this type of high-quality 
training.
  I have requested an evaluation to provide a longitudinal look at the 
achievement of children assisted by the program because I believe that 
evaluation must be embedded in all such programs.
  It is overwhelming to bear heart-felt expressions of appreciation for 
the program and its leaders when I have visited Even Start programs. 
Adults marveled at the change in their children's feeling about reading 
and learning when they were able to make reading together a daily 
activity. One mother told me how she thought she couldn't help her 5 
year old with reading, but, thanks to the program, she realized that 
reading together enabled them to help each other with the words each 
didn't know.
  All children deserve an even start. This bill will assure that Even 
Start facilitators will be well-trained to help parents learn the 
skills that enable their children to be competitive at the starting 
line.

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