House Committee on Education and Labor
U.S. House of Representatives

Thank you Chairman Miller. I first want to thank you for working with my staff and our Republican Committee staff to strengthen and improve this bill. 

I’m pleased to have introduced the Education Begins At Home Act with Rep. Danny Davis.  This bill would establish a federal funding stream for quality, voluntary home visitation programs for parents with young children.  I first became aware of this bill by law enforcement officials in my District who stressed the importance of early childhood intervention.  These officers saw firsthand the stress placed on disadvantaged and first-time families who struggle to provide a safe and healthy upbringing for their children, many simply unaware of how to appropriately care for their child.  Home visitation programs help to break the cycle of poverty and abuse by teaching parents about healthy childhood development and positive parenting skills. 

Research shows that quality home visitation programs are associated with positive outcomes for children and families, including:  improved school readiness, enhanced parenting practices, decreased child maltreatment and reduction in criminality for both the parent and future child.  One model that is used in my home state of Pennsylvania, the Nurse Family Partnership, has proven to reduce abuse and neglect by 50% and later arrests by 60%.

The Education Begins At Home Act also provides a special emphasis on military families and families who are English Language Learners (ELL).  Both of these groups have special needs which home visitation programs can help to address.  Military families often consist of a single parent family, struggling to raise young children while their partner is on deployment.   Home visitors ensure that military families and English Language Learners are connected to community resources that are available and address their specific needs.

The manager’s amendment further ensures that our federal dollars will be spent most appropriately by including quality benchmarks for programs who can receive the money and by targeting resources to communities that are most in need.  I also thank the Chairman for including a reasonable state matching requirement to allow states to use federal dollars to leverage even more funds.   I appreciate both the Chairman and Ranking Member’s leadership on this bill and on issues of early childhood education.  With that, I yield back.

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