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Wilmington Head Start, Inc. Agency Report

Kimberly Bolden

Wilmington University
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Wilmington Head Start, Inc. Agency Report

Head Start is a inclusive early childhood program for low-income children and their

families, all 50 states participate in the Head Start program, this includes the District of

Columbia, Puerto Rico, the Virgin Islands, the outer Pacific Islands, and in 150 Tribal Nations.

Since its inception, Head Starts mission is to promote respect, self-sufficiency, self-worth and

loving and nurturing relationships. The values of the Head Start program is founded on mutual

respect, self-worth, and the provision of supportive and nurturing relationships. As a solid fixture

in every state, Head Start is a leader in the field of early care and education, always identifying

the necessities of low-income young children and recognizing the barriers, eliminating and

helping them grow developmentally and socially. (https://eclkc.ohs.acf.hhs.gov)

Wilmington Head Start, Inc. is a comprehensive early childhood preschool program that

was established in 1984. WHS serves primarily low income children ages 3-5 and their families

who are residents of the city of Wilmington Delaware. The mission statement of Wilmington

Head Start, Inc. is to empower families to become self-sufficient while providing

comprehensive services to children and their families. WHS has 3 sites within the city of

Wilmington and serves a total of 477 children per year. (http://www.wilmheadstart.org)

The provision of services provided by WHS are comprised of education, health,

disabilities, nutrition, male involvement and family services. The education component promotes

school readiness and focuses on the domain areas such as math, literacy, science, social studies,

music and art as well as physical activities. Every child that is enrolled in Wilmington Head

Start, Inc. is screened by a local school district. This screening is completed with the parents
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Wilmington Head Start, Inc. Agency Report

permission. The results of the screening are given to the parent and put in the childs file. If there

is a concern with the screening, a member of the staff will contact the parent to discuss the

results and options. In the health component, all children receive health and development

screenings, nutritious meals, oral health and mental health support and WHS link families with

medical, dental, and mental health services to guarantee that children are receiving the services

they need. (http://www.wilmheadstart.org)

Wilmington Head Start, Inc. has a highly skilled and experienced program governance that

consist of the Board of Directors who assume legal and fiscal responsibility for WHS and the

protection of federal funds. Policy Council is an elected group of parents whose children are

currently in the program, that is derived from the parent committee. They undertake the

responsibility for the direction of WHS with the assistance from the Executive Director and the

management team implements policies and develop procedures, provide training and technical

assistance, supervise staff and monitor compliance within the organization.

(http://www.wilmheadstart.org)

Wilmington Head Start funds are derived from federal and state funding as well as

Purchase of Care subsidies. The Congress of the United States approves the amount of federal

spending for Head Start each year. The Head Start program is managed by the Administration for

Children and Families (ACF) within the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS).

Federal grants are awarded promptly to public agencies, private nonprofit and for-profit

organizations, tribal governments, and school systems for operating Head Start programs in local

communities. (http://www.wilmheadstart.org)
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Wilmington Head Start, Inc. Agency Report

Parents are highly valued at Wilmington Head Start, Inc. each family will receive home

visits from the teacher and the Family Service Advocate. The goal of these visits is to get to

know the family in their own setting, inform the parent about the childs progress, and help the

family set goals. The teacher is scheduled to conduct two home visits with each family during the

program year and the Family Service Advocate will visit once. Parents are encouraged to

participate in the Parent Committee and Policy Council which oversees communication and

oversight of the overall program. (http://www.wilmheadstart.org)

Parent participation is the cornerstone of Wilmington Head Start, Inc. and there is a

strong focus on parents as partners with the education staff in their childs education. Also,

parents and families are supported in achieving their own goals, such as housing stability,

continued education, and financial security. Programs support and strengthen parent-child

relationships and engage families around childrens learning and development.

(http://www.wilmheadstart.org)

Head Start has a long history of acknowledging that male family members and father

figures are important contributors to the school readiness of children and to the well-being of

families. Wilmington Head Start, Inc. always involve fathers as supporters and

first teachers of their children. Wilmington Head Start, Inc. also engage fathers in fostering and

implementing desired interests and in accomplishing their personal goals. Male and father

figures have significant and exceptional roles at Wilmington Head Start, Inc.

(http://www.wilmheadstart.org)

According to the office of Head Start, Male involvement contributes to raising a child

and Father engagement means making a commitment to a partnership. Fathers producing

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Wilmington Head Start, Inc. Agency Report

positive relationships with their children creates good outcomes. Relationship building focus on

making and nourishing bonds. The intent is to support families and to benefit childrens

learning and development. (https://eclkc.ohs.acf.hhs.gov)

At WHS positive male involvement means that fathers and staff work as partners to

encourage the childs best interest, to exchange information about the child, and to share in

program governance. Collaborating as a team to create child and family goals are inspiring and

rewarding to the fathers and the teaching teams. Male involvement prompts staff to show

genuine interest and respect for dad and relationship building and acceptance of the fathers

creates opportunities for meaningful communication. ( https://eclkc.ohs.acf.hhs.gov)

As mentioned before, Wilmington Head Start, Inc. serves primarily low income families

the city of Wilmington Delaware. Most of these families are comprised of single parents and

their children. Here is the breakdown of the families that we serve: 57% Male, 43% Female,

80% English, Spanish, 1% Arabic, 90% of families receive some form of public assistance,80%

of families are single parents, 20% of families are two-parent households, 10% are children with

disabilities 66% are African American, 20% are Hispanic, 12% are Caucasian, 1% are Native

American and 1% Arabic. (https://whs.mycopa.com/)

Head Start programs are driven by the Program Performance Standards and other

policies. Performance Standards are a set of rules that is required by the federal government to

guarantee that families and children receive the best services possible. Head Start performance

standards provide a series of all-inclusive services that is intended to capitalize on the strengths

of each child and to provide support to the family. (https://eclkc.ohs.acf.hhs.gov)

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Wilmington Head Start, Inc. Agency Report

Some of the policies and procedures that are derived from the Performance Standards are: The

management team and teachers must have a Bachelor or Associates Degree in Early Childhood

Education or a related field from an accredited college or university; including 18 ECE credits in

Child Development or Early Childhood Education with completion of student teaching from an

accredited college or university. At least two years teaching experience in Early Education

setting. Must have at least two years of management and/or supervisory experience.

(http://www.wilmheadstart.org Must be able to read, analyze and interpret general business

periodicals, professional journals, technical procedures or government regulations. Must be able

to write reports, business correspondence and procedures manuals. Ability to effectively present

information and respond to questions from groups of managers, staff, parents and the public.

Must be able to organize, coordinate and monitor Center efforts to comply with all Head Start

Performance Standards, USDA, State of Delaware Licensing, and Wilmington Head Start, Inc.

policies and procedures. Must adhere to the Head Start Program Performance Standards. They

define standards and minimum requirements for the entire range of Head Start services. They are

applicable to both Head Start and Early Head Start programs. (http://www.wilmheadstart.org)

My role in the Capstone project will be to design, organize and record the content of the

Family Fatherhood Program Manual. Although Wilmington Head Start follows guidelines of the

Family Fatherhood program, the organization has not developed a working manual to refer to.

The goal of creating this working document will be to communicate the vision and mission of the

program, to ensure consistency of the implementation of the program, and to create a systematic

approach in the execution of activities, expectations and policy and to use a training manual. The

process of creating this manual will be to develop a mission statement that correlates with
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Wilmington Head Start, Inc. Agency Report

Wilmingtons Head Starts vision, collect all the male involvement activities that have been

utilized thus far, transfer guidelines, policy and guidelines to written form and document in the

manual. Develop a committee to get input consisting of family fatherhood advocate and one

male parent that is involved in the program. Develop and record the statistics of males involved

in the program beginning 2016-2017 school year. The duration of this project will be one full

semester of class. This is a working document, so changes can be made a needed for the optimal

success of the program.

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References

https://eclkc.ohs.acf.hhs.gov.(2016). Retrieved from: https://eclkc.ohs.acf.hhs.gov/hslc/tta-

system/family/father-engagement

https://whs.mycopa.com. (2017).

http://www.wilmheadstart.org. (n.d.) Retrieved from: http://www.wilmheadstart.org/about