Researchers Argue Head Start Study Delayed, Ignored

The findings indicate that youngsters' gains disappeared quickly.

When Congress reauthorized the federal Head Start program for disadvantaged children in 1998, it ordered a national study to measure how much difference the program was making.

Twelve years and nearly $34 million later, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services fulfilled that request, delivering the final results of the “Head Start Impact Study” to federal lawmakers on Jan. 13. But the study findings, which were generally disappointing, got scarcely any mention in the national news media.

Now, the long wait for the findings and the deafening silence that met the results are leading a pair of researchers and the Washington-based Heritage Foundation to ask some hard questions about it. What they want to know is: Did federal officials delay the results, and did...