head start annual outcomes report 2024
it takes a team
At Lorain County Community Action Agency Head Start, we believe in the power of teamwork to transform lives. From our dedicated staff and supportive board to our funders and the vibrant children and families we serve, every contribution is vital to our mission. Our goal is to support and inspire three-, four-, and fiveyear-olds as they embark on their educational journey toward kindergarten. The collaborative relationship between our staff and families leads to great achievements for children. We recognize that parents are their children’s first and most important teacher. We also know they can’t do it alone. It’s our daily commitment to working together that has made Head Start a success for millions of families nationwide for decades.
In 2025, our program will celebrate it’s 60th anniversary. While this milestone is significant, we prefer to celebrate the daily accomplishments of the children we serve. An emotional young boy successfully making it through an entire school day warrants a shout of triumph. A quiet girl finding her voice makes us leap for joy. Every child who receives follow-up services for medical, dental or nutritional needs makes us smile.
These little things add up to creating lifelong learners who aren’t just good students but good citizens and good people. Head Start Works! We have the data and the stories to prove it right here in this report. We are glad you are with us on the journey.
Stefanie Drew received the Barbara Haxton Leadership Award from the Ohio Head Start Association, Inc. (OHSAI) at its June Leadership and Professional Development Conference. She has worked for LCCAA Head Start for 30 years. When Director Shauna Matelski, Ed.D. was named Acting CEO for LCCAA, she was elevated to Acting Head Start Director. In early September, both promotions were made permanent.
‘my team is wonderful’
Tiffany Chappelear takes the collaboration between herself and her child’s Head Start teachers seriously.
Her daughter Sophia needed some outside services such as speech therapy. She also needed help with managing her emotions during busy moments.
Giving her a job to do, such as handing
out soap to her classmates (pictured), helped her make transitions calmly.
Sophia will return to Firelands in the fall for a growth year after making tremendous progress in her first year in the classroom.
“My team is wonderful,” she said. “They really try to work with Sophia.”
LCCAA Head Start is in the midst of a five-year grant during which several assessments and reviews are conducted. During 2022-2023, the Focus Area 1 review was conducted virtually and no issues were found. A CLASS review is scheduled for this fall and a Focus Area 2 review, involving an on-site visit, is expected during this school year.
In the Focus Area 2, the Office of Head Start is looking for grantees to demonstrate their ability to track and assess their program’s progress and performance, use data to drive results and make adjustments and corrections as needed.
When federal reviewers were last on site in November 2018 the program passed with flying colors.
what is head start
Head Start is a federally funded program focused on comprehensive child development. LCCAA is Lorain County’s only Head Start provider. We offer center-based, school-based and home-based options. Head Start serves children ages 3 to 5 and prepares them for kindergarten.
LCCAA’s 2022 Community Needs Assessment showed that more than a quarter of all children under five in Lorain County live at or below the poverty level. This represents approximately 4,750 children who likely qualify for Head Start or Early Head Start.
Current funding allows 691 slots in Head Start. At full enrollment, we are currently able to serve approximately 15 percent of the eligible children in Lorain County.
high quality centers around the county
LCCAA Head Start meets children and families where they are by taking care to locate its centers and collaborative partners where needs are the greatest. LCCAA’s latest Community Needs Assessment verifies that our Head Start Centers are located where the highest population of young children lives and where they are likely to be in low-income families.
Directly Operated
LCCAA Head Start @ Central Plaza, 1949 Broadway Ave., Lorain 44052
LCCAA Head Start @ Elyria, 631 Griswold Road, Elyria 44035
LCCAA Head Start @ Firelands 10643 Vermilion Road, Oberlin 44074
LCCAA Head Start @ Hopkins-Locke, 1050 Reid Avenue, Lorain 44052
LCCAA Head Start @ Wellington 305 Union Street, Wellington 44090
LCCAA Head Start @ LaGrange 12079 LaGrange Road, LaGrange 44050
LCCAA Head Start @South Elyria 107 Oberlin Road, Elyria 44035
Partners
Horizon Educational Centers (3 sites)
Little Lighthouse Learning Center (1 site)
LCCAA Head Start also supplies quality, balanced meals which are often made from scratch and meet strict USDA standards.
The central kitchen, now located on Eighth Street in Lorain, provides more than 78,000 meals annually. Learn more by scanning the code.
Head Start uses 100% of the Federal Poverty Level (FPL) for priority placement. In addition, the program can serve 35% of families whose income is between 101 and 130%. Ten percent of families can exceed 130% of the FPL.
New regulations allow programs to calculate housing expenses to reduce over-income calculations
Families in the following situations are automatically eligible:
◊ Receiving SNAP (Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program)
◊ Receiving TANF (Temporary Assistance to Needy Families)
◊ Receiving SSI (Supplemental Security Income)
◊ Homeless, Foster Care or Kinship Care
high standards
LCCAA Head Start follows exacting standards from both federal and state agencies. Additionally, the agency has its own core values and strategic goals which are based on best practices in early childhood education. The federal office of Head Start defines school readiness as children possessing the skills, knowledge and attitudes necessary for success in school and for later learning in life.
As a Head Start grantee, LCCAA Head Start is required to have school readiness goals and we are responsible for measuring outcomes to ensure children’s development and learning progress through the school year. For more detailed information on these, please see the School Readiness Goals document on our website.
Among the criteria we follow are:
Head Start Early Learning Outcomes Framework: a comprehensively researched set of standards regarding what young children should know and be able to do.
Ohio’s Early Learning and Development Standards: child development standards reflecting the rapid development of young children.
Teacher Credentials: 55 percent of LCCAA employed teachers have a bachelor’s degree or higher in Early Childhood Education or a related field.
Screenings and Assessments: all students are evaluated within 45 days of enrollment so their unique needs can be met. Quarterly assessments monitor growth and progress.
Environment: both classroom environments and teacher interaction with students are regularly evaluated using the seven-point Classroom Assessment Scoring System (CLASS).
Ohio created its Step Up to Quality (SUTQ) system to recognize and promote early learning and development programs that meet quality standards over and above the minimum health and safety licensing requirements.
This summer, SUTQ moved from a five-tiered, star-based system to a three-tiered, medalbased system. LCCAA Head Start centers have long-held the highest rating of five stars. Under the new system, they automatically receive the highest rating of Gold.
SUTQ continues to assess four areas: Learning and Development, Administration and Leadership Practices, Staff Qualifications and Professional Development, and Family and Community Partnerships. Programs are rewarded with higher levels for exceeding basic requirements in all these areas.
stellar outcomes
Widely Held Expectations are tasks and skills children of a certain age are expected to know and be able to perform. They apply to all children in an age group regardless of their household income.
Head Start students make tremendous progress over the course of the school year. Many preschoolers enter Head Start with little to no learning background. By the end of the year, the number of children exceeding expectations has skyrocketed and very few remain below average. For the 2023-2024 school year, LCCAA Head Start students gained the most in the cognitive domain.
Social Emotional Development: how children are learning to control their behavior and emotions, including getting along with other children.
Physical Development: walking, running, healthy eating, gross and fine motor skills ranging from throwing a ball to holding a crayon.
Literacy: identifying letters and their sounds, some basic print concepts, story retelling and children learning to write their names.
Cognitive Development: lengthening attention spans, problem solving, connecting experiences, beginning to understand symbolic thought.
Language Development: speaking and understanding words, following directions, using complete sentences, growing vocabulary.
Mathematics: counting, shapes, patterns and beginning measurement, scientific inquiry and, later, geography and social studies.
CLASS: LCCAA Head Start uses the Classroom Assessment Scoring System to offer teachers feedback on how they interact with students. Our teachers consistently score at or above the national average.
LENA: The Language Environment Analysis system measures how often students speak with teachers and each other. The data is used by teachers to pinpoint opportunities to reach each child.
deeply serving every child and family
Head Start is designed as a two generational approach. We support parents with information about important developmental milestones, guidance on family self-sufficiency goals and more.
Family Service Assistants empower parents by connecting them with other needed services. They also provide support by building relationships and making sure each unique need is met.
LCCAA is deeply committed to early intervention. Head Start works with local school districts through screenings and referrals on a wide range of disabilities. While developing children sometimes acquire skills and abilities at different rates, therapies or other services may help.
Head Start families with concerns should talk to their child’s teacher or their Family Service Assistant. Speech therapy is one of the most common referrals and most concerns are mild and correctable. Referrals are also made for developmental delays, mental health, hearing or visual impairment, autism, fine or gross motor delays and learning disabilities.
Head Start Alumnna Madisyn Daniels is headed to medical school.
Read her story by scanning the code.
When Destiny Samples brought her son Elijah to Firelands Head Start, she was surprised at his reaction.
Elijah had only been cared for by family members up to last fall and entering a class of 20 was overwhelming for him.
Elijah was anxious which came out in behavioral issues. Staff, including Rebecca Koons (pictured), helped Destiny create a plan to reach him and gave her tools to use at home, such as Conscious Discipline.
Conscious Discipline is an evidence-based, trauma-informed approach to social-emotional learning. It provides an array of behavior management strategies and classroom structures that teachers can use to turn everyday situations into learning opportunities. One key is building connections in a compassionate environment.
“I wish I knew about Head Start sooner,” said Destiny, a 2013 graduate of Firelands High School. “They not only changed his life, they changed mine. I became a better parent.”
The staff was impressed with Destiny’s commitment to improve things for her son and family. One example, common among young children who have not been around other children, is learning how to enter play. When a group of children would play with a toy Elijah was interested in, he didn’t know how to appropriately join them and acted out instead.
“When children don’t know how to enter play, they do it in destructive ways,” Site Administrator Pam Caruso said. “Learning that skill changed Elijah’s day. Prior to solving that, he was very isolated.”
Elijah moves on to kindergarten at Firelands Elementary School but his younger brother Gabriel will enter the Head Start classroom this fall.
‘i wish i knew about head start sooner. they not only changed his life, they changed mine.’
‘it was the best thing I ever did for my kids.’
Brittany Green believed so strongly in giving her kids a Head Start, she walked nearly four miles a day to get them to LCCAA’s Hopkins Locke location.
Five-year-olds Akiya and Josiah head to kindergarten at Washington Elementary this fall. Brittany made the 40-minute walk twice a day with a stroller rain or shine. She found the staff very kind and respectful and was thrilled with the progress both children made.
“I walked my kids every day to get them to education,” Brittany said.
Josiah, whom Brittany has parented since age six months, thrived with all she had been able to teach him at home. Akiya needed extra attention as she coped with autism and some behavioral issues.
“My daughter started to come out of her shell,” Brittany said.
Brittany and her new husband Richard have blended their family into a small home off 28th Street in Lorain. The couple just received official custody of Richard’s three older children, ages 15, 14 and 12, who moved from Parma.
Richard works as a landscaper for Go Green in Oberlin and usually gets a ride from a coworker. Occasionally, the couple can borrow a vehicle from a friend. Brittany works part time during the winter season when possible.
They hope to get a van and move to a larger home, but meanwhile, Brittany is ready for the five to start school in Lorain.
“I will walk every single one of them,” she said.
Head Start
Alumnna Paris Johnson now recruits in Lorain for OSU’s Young Scholars Program.
Read her story by scanning the code below.
fiscal accountability
Like all Head Start programs nationwide, LCCAA’s program is funded by grants from the department of Health and Human Services and was originally part of the War on Poverty. LCCAA is the only Head Start provider in Lorain County and has been providing services since 1966. Source
funding sources
in-kind
LCCAA Head Start leverages grant dollars with in-kind contributions from our partners and our volunteers. Our in-kind contributions exceed requirements.
2024-2025 proposed budget
2023-2024 expenditures
LCCAA’s fiscal audit for 2022-23 has been finalized. There were no deficiencies relating to the audit of financial statements, no instances of noncompliance material to the financial statements, and no deficiencies relating to the audit of the major federal and state award programs.
dedication
LCCAA emphasizes professional development by supporting staff members as they seek credentials and degrees, offering tuition reimbursement and celebrating accomplishments.
Head Start Performance Standards lay out the training and qualification requirements for all levels of staff and LCCAA staff typically exceed these requirements. In 2023-2024, more than a dozen staff members sought and earned their Child Development Associate which is considered the foundational credential for the early childhood education profession.
credentials earned in 2023-2024
The following staff members earned their Child Development Associate, the foundational credential for the early childhood education profession:
◊ Hortensia Agosto, Family Services Assistant, Griswold
◊ Susan Alicea, Assistant Teacher, Griswold
◊ Nilsa Baez, Family Service Assistant, Hopkins
◊ Tarnisha Freeman, Family Services Assistant, Wellington
◊ Jordyn Henry, Family Services Assistant, Central
◊ MaDonna Horrocks, Early Childhood Service Worker, Central
◊ Jonelle Kirby, Early Childhood Service Worker, Griswold
◊ Kim Knapp, Assistant Teacher, Griswold
◊ Ruth Martin, Early Childhood Service Worker, Griswold
◊ Yaraydaliz Medina, Early Childhood Service Worker, Hopkins
◊ Stacey Minter, Early Childhood Service Worker, Wellington
◊ Marlis Moon, Assistant Teacher, Griswold
◊ Ivelisse Rivera, Family Service Assistant, Hopkins
◊ Tina Showalter, Family Service Assistant, Firelands
◊ Krystal Speights, Assistant Teacher, Griswold
◊ Chelsea Stubbs, Family Service Assistant, Griswold
◊ Jackie Watkins, Family Service Assistant, Hopkins
Note: Some staff members asked not to be recognized.
involving parents in policies
Head Start requires convening of a Parent Policy Council for each program throughout the country. Parents are encouraged to participate to help make decisions about the program.
Parents are elected by their centers to serve on the council and the president of the council holds a full, voting seat on the LCCAA Board of Directors.
2023-2024 policy council
Melinda Matthews, President
Veronica Belen
Amanda Bruce
Jalisa Campbell
Katie Custer
Kaitlin Fisher
Nateisha Fitzgerald
Damaris Guevara
Chrystine Masarik
Tana Panter
Coreasa Portis
Genesis Rodriguez
Tabatha Smith
by the numbers
