Sandra Graves, director of Champlain Valley Head Start in Burlington on Wednesday, Dec. 17. Photo by Glenn Russell/VTDigger Theo Wells-Spackman is a Report for America corps member who reports for VTDigger. After Sandra Graves, the director of Champlain Valley Head Start in Burlington, submi tted her annual application for federal funding, federal officials sent the request back to her with several issues flagged. Among other similar critiques, the phrase “cultural and linguistic responsiveness” had triggered a hold on her request while she amended her language. “Though it does not explicitly state the terms diversity, equity, or inclusion, the term ‘cultural and linguistic responsiveness’ can be seen as a similar word to DEI,” read a communication to Graves from the federal Office of Head Start, which lies within the Health and Human Services Department, headed by Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. READ MORE “I knew it might be coming,” Graves said of the challenge to her application. “It’s kind of hard to know what words or phrases might trigger a question.” But this particular query was surprising, Graves said, given that the language in question was drawn verbatim from federal Head Start performance standards, and further grounded in the program’s statutory mandates.  Head Start is a federal program that provides child care, meals and other services to young children, parents and pregnant women who have an income below the federal poverty line. In Vermont, roughly 1,250 kids are enrolled in the program, of which advocates report roughly one-fifth are experiencing homelessness. The complications with Graves’ application occurred in what was already a challenging time for many Head Start providers, with the government shutdown this fall causing funding delays across the program. Though Graves’ grant was nearly a month late, her organization was able to avoid layoffs or service freezes, with the Vermont Department for Children and Families offering no-interest loan options to Head Start providers as a backstop. As programs in Vermont continue to apply for their annual federal funding allocations this year, they have encountered significant changes to how federal agencies are handling such requests. While national Head Start leadership remains confident in the program’s stability, Vermont providers are expressing concern about how such modifications will affect them. This focus on ensuring that federal funds do not support DEI-related programming has become par for the course, according to Tommy Sheridan, deputy director of the nonprofit National Head Start Association. The messaging around DEI under President Donald Trump’s administration, Sheridan said, has been a “180 degree difference” from the policies set out by President Joe Biden’s administration. “The Office of Head Start will not approve the use of federal funding for any training and technical assistance (TTA) or other program expenditures that promote or take part in diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) initiatives,” read federal guidance Graves received in March. But in practice, Sheridan said, determining the details of what this shift means has often been challenging for providers. “We have not really received effective guidance at this point from the (Trump) administration about what they’re looking for,” he said Monday. Christy Swenson, who chairs the board of the Vermont Head Start Association and directs the Head Start Program at Capstone Community Action in Barre, said guidance from the federal level has not only been unclear but at times also contradictory to law. “Many of the guidances that have been provided over the last nine months are directly in opposition to the Head Start Act,” she said in an interview earlier this month.  It’s a potential conflict that has drawn national attention in recent months, as Head Start associations in a handful of states sued the Trump administration earlier this year for alleged violations of the 2007 Head Start Act. “We have to follow the law,” Swenson added. “I’m sure there are a lot of programs (that) are confused.” The Department of Health and Human Services did not respond to requests for comment for this story. Children show the monarch butterflies on their hands. Photo courtesy Champlain Valley Head Start Swenson and Sheridan said they had heard a number of reports that artificial intelligence had been used to complete application screenings. Federal communication to Graves referred to a “manual review” of certain phrases in her application, leaving an open question about what other, initial methods were used to screen the document. While the use of AI would be a concern in itself, Swenson said, that practice would be part of a larger movement toward a new kind of federal application review that is simultaneously more cursory and more targeted. Swenson said under the Biden administration, funding request screenings were extremely detailed. In-depth budgets would generate dozens of questions from officials each cycle, she said, with multiple follow-ups over the course of the year to ensure compliance.  Without that oversight, Swenson said, she’s concerned that a small number of programs could begin to misuse funds, which could nonetheless “really darken the reputation of all Head Start programs.” Graves said a small handful of DEI-related queries were the only questions she received from the Office of Head Start this year.  The new process also comes after significant layoffs of federal workers from the Office of Head Start earlier this year, Swenson noted. Graves said the mandatory revisions she had made to her organization’s budget request were essentially semantic. Her team, she said, is “complying to the (federal) directives while still carrying out the individualized services to children and families.” She received her funding award shortly after making those changes to her applications. What “cultural and linguistic responsiveness” actually means for Graves is individualizing her organization’s support for each family, she said. Champlain Valley Head Start provides not just early childhood education, but also home visits for young families and translation assistance when necessary, among other programs. “We live in a very, you know, culturally diverse setting here in Burlington, Vermont,” Graves said. “We will continue to provide those services.” Swenson agreed, citing the Head Start Act once again. “Really at the heart of its intent,” she said, “is that we meet families where they’re at.” Sheridan, the deputy director of the National Head Start Association, said he had heard from the Office of Head Start that the changes in application requirements were designed to streamline and “simplify” the review process. The changes, while “a little bit of a surprise,” hadn’t had harmful results for programs so far, he said, though his team will be monitoring the situation closely. But the new guidance surrounding DEI has affected this year’s funding application process significantly, he said, with programs like Graves’ frequently having requests returned. “We’ve had to go one way, and now we’re having to go the absolute opposite direction,” he said. Nonetheless, Sheridan said he was confident in Head Start’s stability, despite suggestions earlier in the year that the Trump administration might attempt to eliminate the program. “Head Start has continued to have strong bipartisan support,” Sheridan said. “Policymakers trust us — they know that Head Start has strong evidence of its effectiveness.” Read the story on VTDigger here: Watch your language: Trump admin questioned Vermont Head Start provider’s funding request over DEI terms. ...read more read less