This morning, NHSA sent an email very like that sent by PHSA last week. As many of you may know, Yvette Sanchez Fuentes, is stepping down this week.
From NHSA:
National Head Start Association Statement on
Departure of OHS Director Yvette Sanchez Fuentes
WASHINGTON, D.C. – Last week, Yvette Sanchez Fuentes, Director, Office of Head Start at the Administration for Children and Families under the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services announced that she is leaving her post.
The following statement should be attributed to Yasmina Vinci, executive director of the National Head Start Association:
“We respect the enormous dedication Yvette demonstrated when she took the helm of the Office of Head Start four years ago. During her tenure she was charged with the tremendous challenge of navigating and implementing the 2007 Reauthorization of Head Start. Yvette was also instrumental in crafting the President’s proposal for early learning and her tireless efforts over the past year have helped ensure Head Start’s role as the leader of early care and education. She and her team have been diligent in their responsibility to our nation’s poorest children and have fortified the fifty year commitment to providing a window of opportunity to our nation’s most vulnerable children. On a personal note, Yvette has been a wonderful colleague, and I will greatly miss her partnership and friendship. We all appreciate her service to our country, and our children, and wish her the best as she moves to spend more time with her young son and family.”
And PHSA:
Pennsylvania Head Start Community,
Yvette Sanchez Fuentes the director of the Office of Head Start at the Department of Health and Human Services, announced today that she is leaving her post. Her last day in the office will be Nov. 22.
“I want to thank each of you for your support throughout my tenure and especially for your commitment to the poorest children and families across this country,” she wrote in an email to colleagues.
“I know the work is not always easy, but I have seen and felt the impact that each of you has had on making the program better. Together we have implemented dramatic reforms that have raised the quality of services that children and families are receiving today and into the future.”
“It has been a privilege to serve in this administration, that knows and understands that the children who go to the best Head Start programs have an experience that can affect the rest of their lives,”
She wrote. “And this administration is committed to ensuring that every child in Head Start gets that same chance.”
The Pennsylvania Head Start Association thanks Ms. Sanchez Fuentes for her service on behalf of Head Start programs and the families we serve.
Sanchez Fuentes began serving as director in October 2009. Before that, she was the executive director of the National Migrant and Seasonal Head Start Association.
She also worked for the Education Development Center as an early childhood specialist for the International Systems Division and provided technical assistance to projects in Honduras, El Salvador and Egypt.
Under her tenure, Head Start has undergone some of the most dramatic changes in the program’s 50-year history, with new accountability measures for centers taking effect during the last year. The program also recently had to cut seats for about 57,000 children because of sequestration.
Thank you.