WSA submitted an official comment letter to the Office of Head Start on their proposed rules for re-competition of Head Start programs. Our response was developed with the help of directors from member programs across the state, and includes seven major recommendations:
- Remove the 25% quota of recompeted programs per year.
- Let everyone start with a clean slate and don’t reach back to June 2009, so all programs will be judged on the same standards.
- Provide transparency regarding what makes up a deficiency, and develop a clear appeals process.
- Establish a secondary review process on audit findings, to insure that the issues outlined by the auditor were sufficient to justify recompetition.
- Don’t hinder the due process rights of grantees by recompeting programs that have not had their child care license revoked.
- Stay true to the CLASS Pre-K model without cutting corners during the monitoring process.
- Non-Compliances Should Not Factor Into Recompetition.
For a fuller discussion of WSA's recommendations, click here for the letter to OHS (pdf).