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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:
Tuesday, January 25, 2005
Contact: ACF Press Office
(202) 401-9215
HHS Announces Head Start Advisory Panel Appointments
Members to
review national Head Start reporting system
HHS Secretary Tommy G. Thompson today announced the appointment of 10 members to an independent panel of experts on child development to assess the progress in developing and implementing the Head Start National Reporting System (NRS).
“These experts on child development will offer their guidance and perspective so we may improve early learning for our nation’s children,” Secretary Thompson said. “Their contributions will move us toward President Bush’s goal of leaving no child behind.”
In conjunction with an existing technical work group that helped develop the NRS, the panel will find ways to integrate the NRS into a broader assessment of early childhood learning found in the Family and Child Evaluation Survey, the National Impact Study, Head Start’s Performance Based Outcome System as well as the on-going evaluation of the Early Head Start program.
“Early childhood education is important to President Bush because it helps children reach their potential,” said Dr. Wade F. Horn, HHS’ assistant secretary for children and families. “This panel will help ensure that the goals of the Head Start program are being met and children are better prepared to learn when they enter school.”
Under the existing regulations, Head Start grantees must assess the developmental and learning progress of every child in their programs. These assessments take place at the local level with no consistent set of evaluation standards or goals. The NRS was designed to implement a common set of measures, for all four- and five-year-old children at the beginning and end of the program year, to assess the ability of local Head Start programs to achieve positive outcomes.
The members appointed today to the panel are:
• Susan H. Landry (who will serve as chairman). Dr. Landry is a developmental psychologist and a professor in the department of pediatrics at the University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston.
• Donald B. Bailey. Dr. Bailey is the principal investigator of the Carolina Fragile X Project, director of the Frank Porter Graham Child Development Institute and on the faculty at the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill.
• Thomas D. Cook. Dr. Cook is a professor of sociology, psychology, education and social policy at Northwestern University.
• Victoria R. Fu. Dr. Fu is a professor of human development at Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University and serves as a pedagogical consultant at the Child Development Laboratory School.
• Vera Guitierrez Clellen. Dr. Clellen is a professor and coordinator of the bilingual certificate program in the School of Speech, Language and Hearing Sciences at San Diego State University.
• Ronald T. Haskins. Dr. Haskins is a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution and a senior consultant at the Annie E. Casey Foundation.
• Christopher J. Lonigan. Dr. Lonigan is a professor of psychology and the associate director of the Florida Center for Reading Research.
• Donald A. Rock. Dr. Rock is a senior associate in the research and development division at Educational Testing Service in Princeton.
• Prentice Starkey. Dr. Starkey is an associate professor at the University of California at Berkeley’s graduate school of education.
• Dorothy Strickland. Dr. Strickland is a professor of reading at Rutgers University’s graduate school of education.
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Note: All HHS press releases, fact sheets and other press materials are available at www.hhs.gov/news