(NNPA) – Since 1964, the Head Start program has been a lifeline for generations of women and families, providing free, high-quality educational, health, social-emotional and nutritional services and opening doors to opportunity and economic justice that had long been kept shut. Now, as Head Start approaches its 60th anniversary, it’s a great time to look back on all that the program has achieved – and look forward to what our country could look like if Head Start was strengthened.It’s been said that when it began, Head Start was not simply an “innovation” but also an “invention,” and a radical one at that. President Lyndon Johnson, a former teacher in a one-room schoolhouse, believed strongly that education was the key to breaking the cycle of poverty, and Head Start was one of the earliest elements of the “War on Poverty” launched by his administration.Related Stories
He put the whole engine of government to work on disrupting the cycle of poverty that endured from one generation to the next and advanced a social justice agenda in areas where educational opportunity was denied based on race. Naturally, this intersects with the issue of economic justice for women.As Marian Wright Edelman – the first...
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