Taundwa Jeffries,
Head Start State Collaboration Office

Kate Miller: Hello and welcome to the Project HOPE Virginia podcast, Empowering Voices in Homeless Education and McKinney-Vento. In this episode of the podcast, we are joined by Taundwa Jeffries, Executive Director of Virginia’s Head Start State Collaboration Office. Taundwa helps connect early childhood programs, agencies, and systems to strengthen access and outcomes for young children and their families. She brings both statewide leadership and a deeply personal connection as a former Head Start parent. Today, she’ll share how Head Start’s comprehensive early supports can serve as a stabilizing force for early learners and a critical foundation for their long-term success. Thank you so much for joining us today, Taundwa.

Taundwa Jeffries: Good morning, and thank you for inviting me to be here with you. Happy to have a discussion about Head Start this morning.

Kate Miller: We’re so happy to have you here. Just getting started for listeners who may not be as familiar with Head Start, can you share a brief overview of the program, a little bit about its mission, its vision, and why it was originally established?

Taundwa Jeffries: Sure, and so many people know parts of the history of Head Start, but I’ll give you some foundational background. So Head Start was established in 1965, and that was under President Lyndon B. Johnson’s administration, and it was his response to the war on poverty. There was a lot happening during that time, and so the original goal was really simple – just trying to break the cycle of poverty for families. So when they establish their vision, it’s really around every child, regardless of circumstance, background, or zip code, entering kindergarten ready, being confident, and ready to succeed. They have implemented a two-generational approach, which really centers around the whole family. And so that’s where those comprehensive services come in and those supports, which include education and health, mental health, nutrition, disabilities, and family support services.

Kate Miller: Thank you so much for sharing that history behind Head Start. I know it’s such a household name now, but it’s really interesting to hear just how long it’s been a resource for families and children in the US. Taundwa, can you give us a snapshot of Head Start specifically in Virginia and talk a little bit about how many children and families are currently served statewide by the program, and what do we know about the number of children experiencing homelessness who are enrolled in Head Start?

Taundwa Jeffries: Sure. So, currently in Virginia, we are serving just under 11,000 early Head Start and Head Start preschool children. Those are the total number of slots that we’re funded for in our state. And so those particular slots are dispersed across 69 programs. Those particular programs could be different agency types, whether a school division or a community action agency, which is about a third of those slots. Then the other third is made up of a combination of private, public nonprofit agencies, as well as some government agencies.

And they are awarded grants through a competitive grant process to be able to serve children and families in particular localities across the state. When we look at the data surrounding our homeless children and families that we’re serving currently, based on the program information report, which is a comprehensive data report that is shared for every program. We have seven and a half percent of our total slots of children that were served, that were experiencing homelessness. We do have our family service staff that work really closely with our families to support them. And of that, that seven and a half percent, we were able to ensure that families had the capabilities to acquire housing throughout the process. So that is a smaller number, but we are still making sure that we are connecting with our families in a way to prioritize them in our categorical eligibility.

Kate Miller: Right. It’s really powerful, I think, for a lot of listeners to hear that 7 and 1/2 percent of those Head Start students are facing housing instability in Virginia. And thinking about those children who are low-income or facing housing instability, can you talk about what are some of those specific barriers or setbacks that they’re facing even before they reach kindergarten because of those challenges of housing instability, particularly if they’re not connected to services like Head Start?

Taundwa Jeffries: Definitely. So our goal is to again prioritize these families. And of course, this looks different from locality to locality. The numbers might be a little bit more increased with the level of support that they’re providing families. But those particular children that are experiencing poverty and homelessness often face some really significant challenges before they ever even enter a pre-classroom, you know. There’s a lot of disruptions in routines and relationships, and there’s the additional level of trauma associated with those experiences. And they may have some limited access to learning opportunities. And so the Head Start model is there to wrap around those supports for families to make sure that we are providing them with community resources and connecting them to, such as their McKinney-Vento liaisons that are our content experts. And they are that conduit of information for us to make sure that families can be advocates for their children and that they have an understanding of what the McKinney-Vento Act states as the definition of homelessness. And that has been utilized in our Head Start program since 2011. We made sure that we aligned our regulatory guidance with the McKinney-Vento Act in its definition so that we were not allowing families to fall through the cracks.

Kate Miller: That’s really great to hear how aligned that Head Start policies and procedures are with McKinney-Vento policies and procedures, and how connected that each of your programs are to your local liaison. You talked a little bit about the general kind of traumas or disruptions that young children experiencing homelessness might be facing. Can you talk about why early intervention is so critical for long-term outcomes for those children, and the educational impact that it can have in disrupting the cycle that they’re experiencing?

Taundwa Jeffries: Yeah, so early intervention is really critical because during that timeframe, that’s those early years of brain development. So experiences at this time can be both positive and negative and have some lasting impact in a child’s life, especially on their lifelong learning, their health, their wellbeing. So we wanna make sure that we’re addressing their immediate needs of securing housing, but we’re also working to shape some long-term outcomes for the families. Again, that is that level of wraparound, those comprehensive reports that are so important in Headstock programs for these families that are highest in need. And it helps us individualize how we are supporting families towards self-sufficiency.

Kate Miller: Right. That’s really wonderful. I know that Head Start uses categorical eligibility to reach families who might not otherwise be reached or connected to services. Can you talk about how this works and why it’s such an important tool for preventing families from otherwise falling through the cracks?

Taundwa Jeffries: So the categorical eligibility was implemented in order to make sure that we were prioritizing children most in need. So it ensures that those families in crisis can be prioritized. We’re helping to reduce barriers to access. So we’ve put things in place so that there’s less redundancy in the work. that we are doing to support enrollment. So the 2007 School Readiness Act, that is when we added homelessness as a categorical eligibility group. We have additionally, besides children and families experiencing homelessness, we also prioritize children in foster care, families that receive welfare benefits that would be SNAP recipients, TANF, SSI, and families that are in kinship care situations where they have other family members that are their guardians because of some family trauma that may have occurred. And so they have to live with someone other than their biological parent. We put in regulatory guidance to reduce the amount of paperwork that these particular families have to provide and the documentation they have to provide. Again, just not wanting to add to any additional stressors when they are already facing some insurmountable situations that cause the level of instability that they’re currently experiencing.

I believe that there’s a thread through all of this when it comes to Head Start. And that is, we are here for the whole family and making sure that we put strategies and approaches in place to support the entire family from enrollment to transition when they leave us and head into kindergarten.

Kate Miller: Right. Why do you think that’s so essential to the success of Head Start, but also essential to the success of these students and families in where they end up long term in reaching their goals?

Taundwa Jeffries: So family engagement is really the cornerstone of Head Start, of the model that we implement. Parents are their child’s first teacher. And we make sure that we highlight that and we share with them how important their role is throughout the entire process. We have parents involved in our governance structure. So they participate in policy council and help decision-making when it comes to how the federal regulatory guidance is implemented in programs. It definitely begins to kind of shift that narrative from where we’re just helping families, and it’s more about empowering them.

Kate Miller: That’s really neat to hear that they’re also involved in that decision making and governance process as well, which I think on a macro level is really important that their experience is impacting the decisions being made, but also for them as individuals, I feel like that’s probably also turning them into even stronger advocates for their children and their families. As the executive director of the Head Start State Collaboration Office in Virginia, can you talk about the purpose of your office specifically and the role that it plays as a connector across early childhood programs, across agencies and other systems?

Taundwa Jeffries: So this is our only true federal to locally funded program, early childhood program that operates in Virginia. And the role of my office is really around strengthening partnerships and aligning with our state priorities. So I make sure that I am participating on necessary boards and committees to help improve access to services for families and elevate these families that are highest in need. In our division of early childhood care and education at the Virginia Department of Education, we work very cohesively. We are one of very few states that have a unified system. And so all of our early childhood programs are operating under one umbrella.

And so I work day to day to ensure that Head Start is incorporated into this unified system as seamlessly as possible. Of course, barring any regulatory restrictions, but making sure that our state initiatives align with our federal guidance, that families in vulnerable populations are included in our decision-making, especially those families experiencing homelessness. And across all of our early childhood programs here operating in Virginia, experiencing homelessness is recognized in their eligibility criteria as well. So we make sure to increase the lens on these families so that no child essentially is left behind.

Kate Miller: That’s really inspiring to hear about that one unified system. And I didn’t realize how unique that is to a small number of states like Virginia. But thinking about that, and then also from the perspective of a parent of a young child experiencing poverty or housing instability, can you describe what it’s like for someone like that parent, what it’s like for them to navigate a fragmented or a system where it’s hard to access services when they’re seeking support for their child, and then how that unified system in Virginia helps to mitigate that kind of fragmented experience?

Taundwa Jeffries: Sure, so from that perspective, thinking from the parents’ lens who’s experiencing this very stressful situation of housing instability and kind of navigating systems, what we find is it could be very overwhelming and exhausting for them. And they find themselves telling their story over and over again as they’re being referred to various agencies. And so the work from my office is to help improve their experiences. It’s promoting a level of coordination with some key stakeholders and some partner agencies. So there’s a level of alignment across the entire system. You know, when agencies align with all federal confidentiality regulations, when we have the ability to share information across agencies, it does help streamline processes for families. And so it allows us to focus more on being supportive and not burdensome for families, not adding to the challenges in their life. But it also shapes the experiences their child may have as they continue on through these programs because they know we’re not here to scrutinize. We’re not here to judge. We’re here to make sure that you receive all the services that are accessible to you, and your child has the best high-quality experience in our early childhood program.

Kate Miller: Right. And I know from your own experience, you’re not only a leader at Head Start in Virginia, but you also can look at it and look at your work through the lens of a parent. And can you talk about what that journey was like for you, your child, and your family?

Taundwa Jeffries: Wow, so two of my children did attend Early Head Start and Head Start. So, you know, these experiences definitely shaped my approach to my work. As a former Early Head Start and Head Start parent, my personal experiences, they help ground me in my leadership, and they really reinforce the importance of policies that work for families. I can speak to, I don’t know how effective this will be on the ground and in the field, you know, as we are making determinations around how programs should operate. My motivation truly comes from seeing families that have achieved sustainability. You know, I’m very proud that my children are alumni of this program and, you know, they have had opportunities to share about their experiences in the early childhood program.

But, you know, I want to make sure that I emphasize the point of bringing back that thread of family engagement. I felt empowered. I felt supported. I was able to navigate through helping my children receive the most high quality experiences in early childhood. At the same time, I was able to get my needs met through the comprehensive services, and through working for Head Start for such an extended period of time, it helped in my own personal career path. And I’ve excelled from various levels, and now being in state government on the other side as part of the decision making, as part of continuing this great pathway, it warms my heart that I have the ability to help families who are in situations such as my own.

Kate Miller: Thank you. It is so heartwarming to hear your story. It’s a really kind of full circle story and just demonstrates how much the Head Start program has given to your children and to you, but now how much you’re able to give back to it in return. I’d love to ask, looking ahead, what initiatives or priorities at the Head Start State Collaboration Office are you most excited about right now? Looking ahead.

Taundwa Jeffries: There’s a lot happening, as you can imagine, on the state level when it comes to early childhood. There are some particular bills that are going through our General Assembly right now that may directly impact our programming. But from my personal strategic planning, what I’m looking at for the Head Start State Collaboration Office is to have more data-driven initiatives. That is definitely going to help us tell the story better of Head Start. Identify where partnerships can be expanded. Think about how outcomes can be stronger for families. But in order to really articulate that story the best, I know we need to do it through the data. So we’re looking at some more innovative approaches of how we’re going to collect data, how we will compile the data, and how we will share it with the field.

Kate Miller: Again, you’ve set me up wonderfully for our next question. I’m excited to hear those stories as they connect to the data that’s coming out of Virginia’s Head Start programs. And I was going to ask you, as a way to close out our interview, if there is a particular success story from your work that continues to motivate you and reminds you of why this work is so important?

Taundwa Jeffries: So there’s so much, aside from my personal story, I can definitely think about a particular family who moved here after Hurricane Katrina, and they came from Louisiana. And so they were trying to figure out how to navigate living in a new state, understand what community resources were available to them. And early on in my career and in my role as a family service worker, I was able to help support this family from beginning to end. So mom was able to get the children registered in schools. She was a teenage mom with two young children, three and four. And so I was able to support her in getting her children enrolled in school. I was able to guide her through the process of enrolling in community college. And I followed her over the next couple of years. She was able to get her degree. She was inspired, and she was able to secure employment as an instructional assistant for the school system. And that kind of put her on her trajectory towards self-sufficiency. So to look back at someone coming here as a stranger, not understanding anything about the state of Virginia, and me playing an integral role in her being able to have secured housing for her family and be able to start her own career. It really lets me know that the work that we do is so critical and so important to all the children and families that we interact with.

Kate Miller: That really is such a powerful story. Thank you for sharing that with us. It really does just demonstrate the power that you’ve had for so many families and young children that you’ve worked with over the years, but in the power of the Head Start program itself and just that concept that you were talking about earlier, just wrapping around not just the students, but their entire family as well to, giving them supports that will then have a ripple effect throughout their entire lives. So thank you for sharing that story with us today. And thank you so much for taking the time to share your insights and experiences with us today. It’s so clear that you’re making such an incredible difference for young children and families across Virginia by ensuring they receive the support that they need to achieve long-term success. And to our listeners who would like to learn more about the work of our McKinney-Vento Liaisons across the state, to find your local division’s McKinney-Vento Liaison, or to access resources for early childhood educators who are serving young children who are facing housing instability, you can visit www.projecthopevirginia.org. Thanks again for joining us.