In a recent interview, an official with the Biden administration sat down with The Imprint to describe how the federal government is working to repair harm caused over centuries to Native American families — with a focus on the earliest years of a child’s life.
Katie Hamm, deputy assistant secretary for the Office of Early Childhood Development, acknowledged the “many, many centuries of policies perpetrated by the U.S. government that have been harmful” to tribal families. But she stressed her office’s commitment to changing that historical narrative through funding for child care, preschool and home-visiting programs that assist families with newborns.
Hamm joined the office within the Administration for Children and Families (ACF) in February 2021. Prior to that, she worked at the Center for American Progress as the vice president for early childhood policy.
Her current post at the Office of Early Childhood Development office oversees home visiting programs, early childhood education and Head Start — the federally funded program that promotes school readiness for low-income children from birth to age 5 and serves all foster youth.
“The system we have is not as supportive as it needs to be, or as accessible or as high quality as it needs to be. So that’s where our policy should be focused,” Hamm said.
She also described the unique relationship the federal government has with tribes: “The Biden-Harris administration has taken steps to really acknowledge and center Indigenous knowledge in our work with tribes. Since we do have a nation-to-nation relationship, we are also constantly seeking, from tribes, information on what they see as successful.”
This conversation has been condensed and lightly edited for clarity and length.
First off, I’d like to ask you some further details about the story I covered earlier this month on tribal home visiting programs funded by the federal government. Tell me why these programs are effective, and in what specific ways? Have you ever seen participants in person, and if so what is your sense of this home-based assistance and how much it helps?
So I have had the opportunity to visit a couple of the Tribal Home visiting programs. And one thing that I think is really important to center is that home visiting is very much rooted in tribal culture and the idea that the community supports a new parent and a new family through pregnancy and through those critical first years.
We’re grateful that we have these expanded resources to invest in more tribal communities so that they have those resources to build on and expand their traditions and their efforts, and really root that support for that parent and child in tribal culture and Indigenous knowledge. It’s been wonderful to see the relationship that the home visitors can establish with the parents and with the families, and how they’re able to, through those relationships, really embed that support. And in this case, the bulk of the funding is focused on evidence-based practices and models that have research that, over time, shows some of the benefits for the families that participate.
If you were to take stock of the state of child care, early childhood education and Head Start-type programs within tribal communities, both on and off the many reservations across the U.S., how would you describe the availability of these types of services and programs?
What we consistently hear from tribes is that they do not have enough resources in early childhood to serve the children in their community who would benefit from services. And they reflect to us that there’s a lot of need in their communities when it comes to finding child care so that parents can pursue work or education. When it comes to Head Start and the children who would benefit from the comprehensive services that address physical development, nutrition, developmental screenings, their resources simply aren’t there to serve all children who need it.
We also have a lot of tribes that we work with that are located in remote areas of the country, including places like Alaska, where the only way to access programs is through planes. So we do see that there’s a lot of need and a lot of special considerations for tribes when it comes to how they have the resources, or not have the resources, to implement programs.
If sufficient resources are granted, how would you describe the benefits to tribes and their members?
We have heard from so many tribes that — especially with the intergenerational disruption of tribal knowledge and culture and language that the boarding schools created — they really see early childhood education as a way to surround children with their culture, community and their language in their formative years. By providing children with that connection, a sense of self develops as a result. It really can have lasting impacts as children grow and develop and go to school.
When we talk to tribes, they want to be able to offer that to more children. And a lot of our work has been looking at the provisions and partners in our programs to make them more adaptable and accessible.
Can you explain to our readers how the Administration for Children and Families funds programs like these that operate on tribal lands, and are the programs operating differently or promoted differently than they are for non-Native communities?
It serves three early childhood funding streams to tribes, and that includes Tribal Home Visiting, it includes the Head Start program, and it includes the Child Care and Development Fund. The Child Care Development Fund serves the most tribes. Over 250 tribes receive child care funding, and there’s a number of tribes who receive Head Start. It’s a smaller group, though.
Head Start is a competitive grant program, and tribes apply for funding. We have a number of tribes who’ve been Head Start grantees for many years, and then if new funding becomes available, there’s a competitive process for expansion. Head Start operates pretty differently than childcare, in that there are a set of program standards that all grantees adhere to, that speak to things like the different elements of a child’s development that should be addressed, teacher qualifications, different staff requirements, training requirements, child health and safety provisions. We have tribes that will do language immersion programs, and will adapt a different curriculum to meet their tribe’s needs.
“We have heard from so many tribes that — especially with the intergenerational disruption of tribal knowledge and culture and language that the boarding schools created — they really see early childhood education as a way to surround children with their culture, community and their language in their formative years.”
— Katie Hamm, Office of Early Childhood Development
Have programs your office oversees faced mistrust from Indigenous communities, based on the federal government’s centuries of abusive boarding school policies? If so, have efforts been made to build trust, and in what ways?
There have been many, many centuries of policies perpetrated by the U.S. government that have been harmful to tribal communities. When you come into this role and you are trying to build relationships, you just have to be very conscious of that. And it is rational and logical to have that skepticism or distrust, given the history. I see my role and the role of the staff at ACF to be really earning that trust and making sure that we’re operating in good faith to support tribes and the early childhood programs that they want to build.
One thing we have done is to have consultations and listening sessions and try to have a feedback loop where we’re giving information about what we’re doing with the feedback they’re providing, how we’re being responsive. I really think that as federal employees and federal leaders, we have to earn that trust by showing and demonstrating that we are working in good faith as nation to nation partners. But I think it’s impossible to have that nation-to-nation relationship if it doesn’t take into account the history.
Our outlet focuses on the child welfare system, and much of our coverage focuses on disproportionately impacted kids, including Indigenous communities. From your vantage point, what can you tell me about whether adequate access to early education education, child care and Head Start programs can reduce entries into foster care? If the answer is yes, why is that?
I am not a child welfare expert, but I think that when this administration came in, we continued to push for a broad investment. We’ve called for a $70 billion dollar investment in child care, preschool and Head Start. And I think when families have access to programs like Head Start and high quality care, they can have a tremendous impact on families and their overall well-being. We know that the cost of childcare and the cost of early education programs is a huge barrier to families, and it creates a lot of economic stress.
Oftentimes it’s cases that pertain to neglect that result in a family becoming involved in the child welfare system. So if you think about a family having access to free or low-cost child care or the Head Start program, that can remove a significant cost for that family. It can help the parents pursue education, work, improve their overall family economic situation, while also being able to use their income on things like rent and utilities and food.
So I think it can have a pretty big impact on families and their well-being, and that can have spillover effects into things like the child’s trajectory in school, whether the family becomes involved in child welfare and other things when you lift the family up and help them access those programs.
