Background: Education plays a pivotal role in empowering individuals with the knowledge and skills needed for careers, economic progress, and societal engagement. Dropping out of school before achieving a qualification undermines these opportunities and has an impact on individuals and society (Audit Commission, 2010; OECD, 2023). International…

Discusses the findings of the Westinghouse Report and suggests they be considered a limited and partial description of the effects of using Head Start to educate children. (DR)

System Development Corporation conducted an extensive project for compensatory educational intervention for older disadvantaged youth in secondary and postsecondary education. Two intervention strategies were developed, and this report discusses the design of a longitudinal study to evaluate the effects of models growing out of those…

Article by the Deputy Director (Development) of the National Children's Bureau, London, surveys U.S. research on compensatory education from the 1960's and Head Start, concludes that normally only those programs are effective in the long term which focus on the parent-child relationship. (Author/JM)

System Development Corporation conducted an extensive project of conceptualization and planning of models for compensatory educational intervention for older disadvantaged youth, at the secondary and postsecondary levels. Two intervention strategies were developed, and this report details the development of a field implementation plan for a…

In order to investigate diffusion effects within families involved in an intervention program, 80 disadvantaged children were divided into four groups, three of which were made up of younger siblings of preschool children in the intervention program. In two of these three groups, the mother was also involved in the program. The fourth group was…

The executive summary briefly restates the results of a 17-month excursion into the realm of compensatory education of older disadvantaged youth. During September 1976 through January 1978, System Development Corporation conducted a project to conceptualize models for compensatory educational intervention at the secondary and postsecondary levels,…

Selected results from a study of compensatory reading programs sponsored by Title I and by other sources are presented and discussed. Various phases of the study included a questionnaire survey of a nationally representative sample of elementary schools, pre- and posttesting of students in grades two, four, and six of a subsample of the original…

This paper argues that social competence should be the primary measure of the success of intervention efforts. Difficulties in defining and assessing social competence are discussed, and an index of social competence, which includes a variety of factors, is suggested. (Author/AM)

The reauthorization of the Follow Through Program (FT), a program designed to reinforce gains made by low income children in preschool, is the subject of this hearing report. Testimony includes a rationale for reauthorizing the program; information and comments concerning the accomplishments and future prospects of FT; a brief historical…

Educational intervention programs involving disadvantaged children have not sufficiently succeeded in the remediation of their academic deficiencies. Gains made appear to be very short term and generally unimpressive. Accepting the assumption that the deficiencies are not genetic, one is led to suspect the adequacy of the educational system.…

Evaluation of Head Start has been based on four sources of information: (1) census surveys of children and families served and programs offered, (2) special research, projects on child development and experimental programs, (3) a longitudinal study of the development of low income children, and (4) a series of national evaluation studies.…

This paper reports the first phase of a larger longitudinal follow-up study of graduates of Youth Aliyah. At its inception in the early 1930's, Youth Aliyah was conceived as an organized campaign to attract Jewish adolescents away from Central Europe and inspire them to move alone or with their families to Palestine. During the war and immediately…

This 3-year study made a longitudinal comparison of three types of preschool intervention programs. The Traditional approach (two classes of 15 students and three teachers each) worked in conventional ways to improve personal, social, motor and general language development; children were placed in a regular public school kindergarten the following…