Sponsor
Mark James Desaulnier
Representative · D-CA
Representative · D-CA
The bill aims to raise Head Start program quality and child behavioral-health supports through evidence-based interventions, training, and evaluation, but does so at added federal cost and with risks of uneven access, local flexibility loss, and implementation burdens for providers.
Children enrolled in Head Start and Early Head Start will gain access to evidence-based behavioral-health and early-learning interventions, improving social-emotional, cognitive, and school-readiness outcomes.
Head Start programs in urban, suburban, and rural areas will have expanded access to grants and dedicated funding that enable rollout of improved interventions and services across diverse communities.
Head Start staff and the early-childhood workforce will get funded training, staff-wellness supports, and new career-development pathways (including up to five university training centers), which can improve retention and program quality.
Taxpayers and the federal budget will bear increased costs from new grants, administrative reviews, research/evaluation activities, training centers, and the $100 million authorization.
Rural, low-resourced, and smaller Head Start programs may struggle to adopt required practices or win competitive grants, risking uneven access to improvements and widening disparities in program quality.
Programs and staff will face added implementation burdens (credentialing, reporting, participation in evaluations, and diverting staff time), which could reduce time and resources available for direct services.
Based on analysis of 7 sections of legislative text.
Creates HHS-led reviews, grants, evaluations, training centers, and authorizes $100M to expand evidence-based early childhood mental health supports in Head Start.
Official title: To direct the Secretary of Health and Human Services to identify, review, and implement effective interventions in Head Start programs, and for other purposes.
Introduced May 29, 2026 by Mark James Desaulnier · Last progress May 29, 2026
Creates a federal program to identify, fund, evaluate, and train Head Start and Early Head Start staff to deliver evidence-based early childhood mental and behavioral health supports. The bill directs HHS to review proven interventions and staff trainings, award grants to Head Start agencies to implement them, evaluate implementation and outcomes, fund up to five university-based Best Practice Centers for training, and authorizes $100 million for these activities through FY2027–2036. The law emphasizes trauma-informed, tiered approaches (universal/selected/indicated), staff wellness supports, voluntary evaluation tools for programs, public input, and periodic updates to reviews and evaluation methods to ensure quality and long-term effectiveness.