Developmental and Health Services in Head Start Preschools: A Tiered Approach to Early Intervention

Abstract Objective To describe a tiered approach to identifying and addressing developmental and health concerns among low-income preschool children in Head Start. Methods Analytic sample consisted of 3- to 5-year-old Head Start students (n = 1171) from 14 centers in Los Angeles County serving predominantly Latino families during 2008−2009. All Head Start students were screened for developmental and health concerns and assigned to 1 of 3 tiers of intervention need: Tier 1 children needed only the usual Head Start curriculum, Tier 2 children needed targeted interventions (excluding special education), and Tier 3 students received special education services. Logistic regressions were used to analyze predictors of each tier, with screening results and sociodemographic variables as covariates. Results Sixty-nine percent of children were in Tier 1, 25% in Tier 2, and 6% in Tier 3. Tier 2 children most commonly needed mental health services and were less likely than those in Tier 1 to be from primarily English-speaking homes (odds ratio = 0.6, P