Introduction

• Current debates about improving Head Start can benefit from hard data on average classroom quality and typical gains made by children in the program.

• The 1997 cohort of the Head Start Family and Child Experiences Survey shed some light on this issue by showing that average classroom quality was “good” on widely-used scales like the ECERS and Assessment Profile.

• FACES 1997 showed that children made significant gains against national norms in vocabulary and early writing skills.

• But FACES 1997 found a lack of progress in letter recognition and early math skills.

• This presentation compares the 1997 cohort with a new national sample of 43 programs and a new cohort of 2,400 children sampled in 2000.