Click Here to Read: Head Start Research: Third Grade Follow-up to the Head Start Impact Study. OPRE Report 2012-45 October 2012.
Here is the pessimistic executive summary of the Federal Governments three-part assessment of outcome in Head Start:
“[T]here was little evidence of systematic differences in children’s elementary school experiences through 3rd grade, between children provided access to Head Start and their counterparts in the control group.”
The previous report showed that any gains “had faded considerably by the end of 1st grade, with Head Start children showing an edge only in learning vocabulary over their peers in the control group who had not participated in Head Start.”