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WASHINGTON – Today, Education and the Workforce Committee Chairwoman Virginia Foxx (R-NC) and Early Childhood, Elementary, and Secondary Education Subcommittee Chairman Aaron Bean (R-FL) sent a comment letter to Department of Health and Human Services Secretary Xavier Becerra urging the Department to reconsider its proposed rulemaking that would jeopardize low-income families’ access to education. 

In the letter, Foxx and Bean write: “Unfortunately, this proposed rule is less about retaining and ensuring ‘consistent quality programming,’ as its title states, and reads more like a collective bargaining agreement. Rather than support the students and families whom Head Start serves or address persistent program oversight needs, the Department of Health and Human Services (the Department) is choosing to depart from legislative language and congressional intent and push Head Start teachers as union contract employees.” 

The lawmakers continue: “Our misgivings about the Office of Head Start’s rulemaking stems from proposals 1) that stipulate onerous and highly prescriptive requirements on a program designed to have local autonomy and that tie those requirements to grant awards; 2) that demonstrate Department overreach by usurping other federal statutes; 3) that favor larger grantees with more resources over smaller providers, including rural and faith-based grantees; and 4) that deflect from improving program quality for students and their families.” 

The lawmakers conclude: “It should go without saying that Head Start has ongoing oversight and program quality needs that must be addressed. … However, rather than taking this opportunity to provide long overdue program quality enhancements for students and their parents, the Department has chosen to put its own unjustified policy preferences over low- income families’ access to education. You need to reevaluate these program changes and instead support a grant-run program that ensures high quality instruction in a safe environment that parents and communities can respect.”

To read the full letter, click here.

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