The National Reporting System: What Is It and How Will It Work?

     The National Reporting System is the next stage of child assessment, program improvement, and accountability in Head Start. by Windy M. Hill, Associate Commissioner of the Head Start Bureau

     A chart of the planets decorates the walls. "Let's go to Mercury," one boy says. "Venus!" exclaims another. The children climb the stairs to their space ship and count down, "Ten! Nine! Eight! Seven! Six! Five! Four! Three! Two! One! Blast off!" The children engage in highly verbal and interactive play, wearing soda-bottle air tanks, exploring both outer space and the inner space of their ship, discussing the effects of zero gravity, sorting moon rocks . . . . One boy peers through a paper roll telescope and exclaims, "We're going to hit the moon! Turn right!" Another boy spins the steering wheel. The teacher observes, noting the wide range of Domain Elements reflected in the children's play.

—from the Head Start video
For a Child, Life is a Creative Adventure

      THE PROCESS OF OBSERVATION AND ASSESSMENT of children's progress is implemented throughout the program year, in various ways, in Head Starts across the country. The Head Start Program Performance Standards call for teachers to conduct ongoing assessments of all Head Start children. Since reauthorization of the Head Start Act in 1998, local programs have been required to analyze assessment information on children's progress three times a year. They must use this outcome information in both their program self-assessments and subsequent qual-ity improvement efforts.

     Programs have done an outstanding job in responding to these mandates and to other requirements of the Head Start Program Performance Standards. The time, energy, and resources that we have devoted in recent years to this effort have done a great deal to enhance the quality of Head Start services and are evident in some patterns of positive child outcomes.

     The Head Start National Reporting System (NRS) adds one more component to complete this picture. In addition to the assessments that programs are currently undertaking, with instruments that are locally chosen, Head Start programs will engage in a brief procedure at the beginning and end of the program year to assess all four-and five-year-olds on a limited set of language, literacy, and numeracy indicators. These indicators are predictive of children's later success in school, especially with reading. By using the same set of tools to collect information from every Head Start program, we will be able to document Head Start's effectiveness nationally in a new, valid, and reliable way. We will not report or examine individual child progress because that is best managed in local programs and in close partnership with parents.

      I know that there are questions about how the NRS will work and what programs need to do to implement this new system. Let me briefly comment on some of the most common areas of concern.

Who Will Be Assessed?

     STARTING IN FALL 2003, 4-AND 5-YEAR-OLDS in various program options will be assessed at the beginning and end of the program year. These assessments will document the benefits of Head Start's comprehensive services on Congressionally-mandated child outcomes. It is important to understand that the NRS is not designed to track or report progress for individual children. Rather, we are interested in the overall progress that groups of children make in each Head Start program, in each region across the country.

What Will Be Assessed and How?

     THE NRS WILL FOCUS ON A LIMITED SET of literacy, language, and numeracy indicators as mandated by Congress in 1998. The system is designed for one-on-one assessment by local staff. The assessment will take approximately 15 minutes per child. Field testing was completed in Spring 2003 in 36 Head Start agencies to make sure that the NRS worked well for diverse types of chil-dren and program settings.

How Will the Assessment Information Be Used?

     INFORMATION FROM THE NRS will be reported back to programs to supplement their local child outcomes and program self-assessment information. Taken together, all of this information can be used by local programs in planning for children and ongoing quality improvement.

      At the national level, the Head Start Bureau (HSB) will use NRS information in its program planning and implementation efforts. The Head Start Bureau and the Regional Offices will also use the information to guide training and technical assistance planning by identifying areas where programs may need additional support.

     In addition, Federal work groups will use the information and experience gained during this first year of the NRS to plan additional ways of looking at child outcomes in future monitoring reviews.

What About English Language Learners?

     THE FIELD TESTING OF THE NRS INCLUDES a process for assessing children's acquisition of English. Assessment materials will be available in both English and Spanish. Work continues on the identification and/ or development of items and procedures appropriate for children who speak other languages.

Will the NRS Assessment Replace the Local Ongoing Assessment Process and Procedures?

     NO. THE NRS WILL ENHANCE CURRENT SYSTEMS by providing additional information for programs to use in understanding the progress that groups of children are making in acquiring literacy, numeracy, and language skills. However, since the NRS will assess only 4-and 5-year-olds, and only on a limited set of indicators, the NRS information can only be supplemental to local assessment procedures and analysis of child outcomes. Programs will continue to use local comprehensive assessment systems and tools to respond to the Head Start Program Performance Standards and to meet local needs.

     What the NRS offers that local program assessments do not is comparability. Because all programs will be using a common framework of measures and assessments, we will be able to draw valid and reliable conclusions about the progress that children in Head Start programs across the nation are making on select indicators. The common set of important indicators will also enhance our ability to aggregate and report data nationally the way programs do locally.

How Can I Prepare My Program For NRS Implementation?

     HERE ARE SOME GUIDELINES for local implementation of the NRS:

• Continue to improve program quality. Remember that the NRS, like all Head Start management and accountability systems, is one of several means to an end— the end is always higher quality services and more positive and lasting benefits for children and families. So continue your efforts to meet and exceed Program Performance Standards, apply best practices in all areas of program services and continue to strengthen curriculum, teaching practices, ongoing assess-ment, and learning opportunities in every center, classroom, home-based, and partnership setting.
• Make sure that staff carry out initial screening appropriately and in the required time frame (45 days)
• Assure ongoing assessment for each child and its use for curriculum planning, individualization, and communication with parents. Successful implementation of NRS will depend on the skills and capacities of staff to administer and utilize early childhood assessments in a quality fashion.
• Think about who will provide local leadership for the NRS. We are using a training-of-trainers strategy to prepare local lead staff in the NRS assessment and reporting procedures. Consider which people in your program could do the best job in carrying out this assignment and adjusting workloads and responsibilities if necessary to accommodate the additional leadership and oversight to successfully launch the NRS in your agency.
• Plan to provide time for staff training on the NRS prior to its implementation in Fall 2003.
• Stay informed. We will continue to communicate directly and through our ACF Regional Offices as we complete the development of the NRS. Refer to the ACYF-IM-HS-03-07 —Head Start National Reporting System on Child Outcomes— issued on June 26, 2003 that is available at www.headstartinfo.org/publications/im03/im03_07.htm. The IM includes information on training, implementation, and financial support for NRC activities.

Next Steps

     NO ONE UNDERESTIMATES THE IMPORTANCE of this endeavor and what it means— not only for Head Start, but for the entire early childhood community. Ultimately, the success of the NRS depends on local leadership and the quality of implementation. We will do our part to make sure you have the knowledge and resources you need to implement the NRS effectively. We will also be counting on you to provide feedback that will help us to improve the system over time.

     In closing, let me point out that the Head Start Bureau is continuing to design and invest in new efforts to help programs apply research, implement best practices, and improve outcomes for children in our diverse programs. The Strategic Teacher Education Program (STEP), through its regional and national training events and its Web-based resource STEP-Net, has played a major role in this effort. STEP has provided intensive and ongoing on-site program support to enhance teacher effectiveness in early literacy and language, social and emotional development, curriculum and assessment, and more. These improvement efforts go hand-in-hand with the National Reporting System. As the NRS develops more detailed and objective ways to measure and report on child outcomes, we will continue to ensure that Head Start programs have the support they need to improve outcomes for children and families.

     Our initial work in developing the NRS in a little over a year is an example of Head Start's ability to accept any challenge. Our commitment ensures that we do whatever it takes to succeed. Success in effectively implementing the National Reporting System will help us to provide more extensive and credible evidence that Head Start works, program-by-program and community-by-community. It will also provide an additional management tool to ensure higher quality outcomes and enhanced opportunities for all Head Start children and families in the future.

     I am deeply grateful to each of you for your commitment to providing quality services in Head Start. Thank you for your hard work on behalf of the Head Start communities you serve.

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Windy M. Hill was named Associate Commissioner of the Head Start Bureau on January 7, 2002. 12