References: 2025 Head Start State Fact Sheets

1. Office of Head Start: Head Start Slots, Grant Counts, and Funding by State in Fiscal Year 2024 (Funding tab).
2. First Five Years Fund, Mapping Head Start Across States and Districts (Zoom in by State and District, Program Sites Nationwide).
3. Office of Head Start, Performance Indicator Report, Program Year 2024 (Downloaded June 25, 2025) (Infants and Toddlers – (EHS all ages) and (MSHS age 0-2); Preschool Children – (HS all ages) and (MSHS age 3-5)).
4. Ibid. (C.50).
5. Ibid. (C.48).
6. Ibid. (C.24, C.25).
7. Ibid. (C.37).
8. David Deming, “Early Childhood Intervention and Life-Cycle Skill Development: Evidence from Head Start,” American Economic Journal: Applied Economics (July 2009).
9. Alexander Gelber and Adam Isen, “Children’s schooling and parents’ behavior: Evidence from the Head Start Impact Study, Journal of Public Economics, Volume 101,” (May 2013). 
10. Terri J. Sabol, P. Lindsay Chase-Lansdale, “The Influence of Low-Income Children’s Participation in Head Start on Their Parents’ Education and Employment,” Journal of Policy Analysis and Management (September 2014). 
11. Office of Head Start, Performance Indicator Report, Program Year 2024 (Downloaded June 25, 2025) (A.2-A.5).*
12. Ibid. (A.10).*
13. Office of Head Start: Head Start Slots, Grant Counts, and Funding by State in Fiscal Year 2024 (Education Staff Counts tab).
14. Office of Head Start, Performance Indicator Report, Program Year 2024 (Downloaded June 25, 2025) (D.7.a and D.8.a).
15. Ibid. (D.7.b).
16. U.S Census Bureau, American Community Survey 2023 Table B17001, “Poverty Status in the Past 12 Months by Sex by Age”
    Note on Methodology: Head Start eligibility is estimated using the best available data. The Census 2023 ACS 5-year estimate is the most recent and accurate population estimate for children under 6 in poverty. Table B17001 disaggregates the data by age 0 to age 5, age 5, and age 6+. FFYF added the number of children in poverty ages 0 through age 5, and then divided by 6, evenly pro-rating this population of children into single-year age categories. Head Start eligibility is calculated as children ages 3 through 5 living in families with incomes below the federal poverty level.
    

*Percentages may add to more or less than 100% due to the rounding of decimal points.