COURTESY OF NIKKITTA JACOBS
“I get calls every day from parents crying…”
She was kind of angry. They [the
teachers] were on top of that.
... They were there for her when
she needed them,” Reynolds explained, when asked why she was
going to these ends.
Roughly 1,500 miles east of
Pratt, in Roanoke, N.C., Nikkitta Jacobs was dealt a similarly
crummy hand. Her son, Jaden,
who turned 3 years old in late
June, was denied a spot at the
Clara Hearne Head Start Center when the program, facing a
$267,000 budget reduction, cut
the incoming class by 37.
A single mother of two, Jacobs
is a devout believer in Head Start’s
benefits. Her 5-year-old daughter
went through the program, which
helped her overcome problems she
had with reading and writing. Jacobs herself serves on the board
governing the local Head Start.
Hoping to ensure that her son
would be able to benefit as her
daughter had, Jacobs began looking at programs outside her district. The extra commute — at
least 20 more minutes — would
be a small inconvenience.
But those other programs are
being pinched as well. With no
help coming from Washington,
Jacobs is growing resigned to the
possibility that Head Start and its
educational benefits won’t be there
for her son. She has a job working with at-risk youth through the
North Carolina Division of Juvenile
Justice. It’s part-time work. But
it’s enough, at the very least, to
cover the cost of day care.
“It can be stressful if you let
it,” said Jacobs. “But I look at the
world kind of differently. You are
only dealt one hand, and either way
something positive will happen.”
Paying for day care is not always
an option for Head Start families,
Recent
budget cuts
at the Clara
Hearne Head
Start Center
forced the
center to
downsize
its classes,
denying
children
like Nikkitta
Jacobs’
(right)
3-year-old
son, Jaden
(left), a spot.