Campaign Promises

Departments -> Health & Human Services -> Head Start

ItemHealth & Human Services
Head StartGrade
HE-12 The Promise: "...Quadruple the number of eligible children for Early Head Start..."
When/Where: Obama-Biden Plan: "Lifetime Success Through Education," dated 10/16/08.
Source: http://doclibrary.com/MSC56/DOC/ObamaEducationPlan12084315.pdf
Status:In CY2009, 66K children were enrolled in the Early Head Start (EHS) program. By end-CY2016, according to a 10/23/18 Congressional Research Service report, 168K children under the age of four were enrolled in EHS. 264K enrollments were needed to "quadruple" the CY2009 number of enrollments.

This promise was not fulfilled.		0.00
HE-13 The Promise: "...will invest $10 billion per year in early intervention educational and developmental programs for children between zero and five. Their plan will help expand Early Head Start..."
When/Where: Obama-Biden Plan: "Empower Americans with Disabilities," dated 09/06/08.
Source: http://www.thearc.org/document.doc?id=3073
Status:More than $1.1 billion earmarked for the Early Head Start (EHS) program under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) of 2009 helped increase participation in the EHS program from 66K in FY2009 to 168K in FY2017.

For FY2015 and FY2016, for example, a combination of Head Start (including Early Head Start) and Child Care and Development Block Grants totaled $10.958B and $11.646B respectively.

This promise was fulfilled.		1.00
HE-14 The Promise: "The Obama-Biden comprehensive "Zero to Five" plan will provide critical support to young children and their parents...will create Early Learning Challenge Grants to promote state "zero to five" efforts and help states move toward voluntary, universal pre-school."
When/Where: Obama and Biden's Plan for America: "Blueprint for Change," dated 10/09/08.
Source: https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/550007-barack-obama-2008-blueprint-for-change.html
Status:The proposed Early Learning Challenge Fund was administered as a collaborative effort between the Departments of Education (DOE) and Health & Human Services (HHS). This fund challenged Governors to develop new model systems that (1) drove results-oriented, standards reform across programs, (2) funded and implemented pathways to improve existing early learning programs, and (3) ensured that more children enter kindergarten ready.

On 5/25/11, the Secretaries of DOE and HHS announced that the Obama Administration would use $500M from the "Race to the Top" Program to fund an initial round of grants to states under what became the Race to the Top-Early Learning Challenge (RTT-ELC) Program.

The period of effectivity for this program was 48 months from its inception and funding for it ceased after FY2013.

This promise was fulfilled.		1.00