Nearly 2,000 families may be without child care at the start of this school year after dozens of child care centers run by Mississippi Action for Progress in northern Mississippi have not reopened after losing their federal funding.

Mississippi Action for Progress Inc., an administrator of Head Start pre-kindergarten centers, has lost funding to run its northern district centers – of which there are 28 listed on the group’s website – after the federal Administration for Children and Families found multiple deficiencies in MAP’s operations, including the group’s failure to report sexual abuse at one of its centers. MAP’s tax disclosures in 2024 showed that its revenue of $78,850,872 came entirely from government grants. 

Head Start is a federal program that, for 60 years, has provided early education and child care to low-income families with children younger than 5. Mississippi is one of a few states where Head Start is available in every county.

While the contract to administer those centers has recently been given to other nonprofits, parents of Head Start children and employees of MAP say they never received any formal communication from the organizations, leading to mass confusion and uncertainty, with questions from parents and teachers flooding Facebook. 

“In the coming weeks, the Office of Head Start will implement a plan to transition Early Head Start and Head Start operations to the leadership of these new grant awardees. This plan includes ensuring Head Start services for families who are expected to return in the fall,” the federal Office of Head Start told Mississippi Today. 

A letter reviewed by Mississippi Today that was sent by MAP Executive Director Bobby Brown to some employees on Friday said the Office of Head Start had asked MAP to provide “temporary, limited services” until “all locations have been transitioned to their new agencies.” While Brown said the temporary services would come with “some limitations and lower enrollment,” the letter did not provide clarity on the number of students who could be enrolled this year, or the number of teachers and staff MAP would retain, besides saying that “identified staff” would return on Tuesday for training and to prepare the centers.  

Despite repeated requests from Mississippi Today, representatives of MAP did not provide the number of students or workers they would retain. 

Mississippi Action for Progress was founded in 1966 with a biracial group of board members including civil rights activist Aaron Henry, who served as president of the Mississippi state conference of the NAACP, and Hodding Carter III, a Pulitzer Prize-winning newspaper publisher and journalist in Greenville. It was one of the earliest organizations in the state to have local Black leadership shape how federal dollars were spent. 

In the early years of the organization, Mississippi’s local government vetoed the spending of federal money and state officials threatened workers. Brown, who most recently drew a salary of $203,167 from the organization, has served as chief executive officer of MAP since at least 2001. He did not respond to repeated requests for comment. 

Scrambling to find child care

For parents and grandparents in north Mississippi, the loss of Head Start came at the worst time: the beginning of the school year. For caregivers, it sometimes has meant calling up day cares in neighboring towns.

“It was sort of a shock for everybody,” said Sheila Summerford, whose granddaughter was set to attend Head Start this month in Fulton.

She had to scramble to find a new day care. Even though Head Start is the best value option, Summerford says she was able to find room at a new day care near the flower store she owns off Main Street. Many centers were already full.

“Everybody’s kids that go there was pretty much just waiting on a start date. And then, I found out through Facebook that they’re not opening yet,” said Sabrina Celeste, mother of a 5-year-old who was also set to attend Head Start this year. 

“And then it was going around that they wasn’t even going to open. And then now somebody got on there and updated everybody, saying that some more companies had took over, but it’s not MAP anymore,” she said. Celeste and her husband have since been taking their daughter to work with them. “Gotta do what you gotta do.”

It’s not clear when the federal Office of Head Start notified MAP that it had not been awarded funding for the northern district. When Mississippi Today reporters visited MAP’s Jackson office Thursday, Ashley Nichols, MAP’s director of community development, said she could not remember the date of notification. 

No one else from MAP’s Jackson office could be reached in person or by phone or email. 

A federal monitoring review of MAP Head Start centers conducted in June 2023 found multiple deficiencies, including negative behaviors demonstrated by MAP staff “causing children to be afraid to attend the center and regress developmentally,” not following appropriate strategies to support children’s independence and individual needs around toileting, and the organization’s failure to report allegations of sexual assault to the Office of Head Start in a timely manner.

Because of the deficiencies, the Office of Head Start notified MAP in 2024 that it would need to re-compete for funding for the 2025 school year. 

Mississippi Today on Friday filed a public records request for all reports regarding MAP Head Starts in the northern district. 

“They should at least send out a text message or something, instead of people finding out through Facebook,” Celeste said. 

“I don’t know what’s going on.”

Kala Holt worked for 16 years for Head Start in Fulton. For the last week, she has called MAP’s Human Resources department, and has been sent to voicemail each time. She was hoping to secure her retirement money.

“I feel like my 16 years are gone. I’m not even sure I want to teach anymore,” she said. “My babies are my babies. I loved what I did. I loved the smile on their faces and the joy that came over them when they learned something new.”

This month, her husband had to ask his aunt for help paying their electricity bill. She said her health insurance is set to expire this month, and that she was focused on securing her retirement money, but when she called the firm, she said it redirected her to MAP’s HR department that ghosted her for a week.

“The unknown of not having a job is very, very stressful,” she said.

Ten employees of MAP Head Start centers told Mississippi Today they found out about the closures through social media and are struggling to find alternative employment, all the while dealing with a lack of communication from their superiors and MAP management. 

“I called down there, left voicemails, they haven’t returned my calls,” said a teacher who asked to remain anonymous for fear of retaliation. 

Holt was expecting to come back to classes in mid August after three days of training in Jackson, like every other year. But no announcement came by the end of July about when class would resume. To this day, Holt hasn’t received any official word from MAP.

“A lot of us want to reapply for the job,” Holt said. “When can we reapply?”

Teachers who spent years at local Head Start centers were disappointed about the change. 

“It’s a messed up situation. I don’t know what’s going on. I put my heart in what I’m doing. The truth is, it’s tough when children don’t know, too,” said Jerry Smith, who was a Head Start teacher for 19 years in Tupelo.

Lately, he’s been helping out after school part time in Lee County. He’s still waiting to hear back on a start date for Head Start.

Longtime employees said they could not get in touch with the same MAP supervisors they would call monthly for check-ups. Some were unsure if they were still MAP employees.

For one pregnant employee who wished to remain anonymous while she navigated the job search process, optimism has turned to dread. She feels her pregnancy has hurt her employment chances. As a single mother, she needs the work.

Another former employee already took another job with a public school.

An employee and mother of two who recently got her associate’s degree in early childhood education found out through Facebook that the Head Start center where she worked for two years shut down and has not been able to find a new job. 

“I picked teaching, and I’m thinking I went to the wrong career,” she said.

“Any other place that I’ve ever worked, there’s an exit method set up for a smooth transition. But it was just like we went to the edge and they just pushed us over,” said another teacher who worked at her MAP Head Start center for six years.  

What’s next?

Federal funds have been allocated to four organizations to run the MAP centers that are closing, according to the Administration for Children and Families, which houses the Office of Head Start. 

Those organizations – Delta Health Alliance, Five County Child Development, Mississippi State University and Pearl River Valley Opportunity – have also been kept in the dark. 

Delta Health Alliance received its award letter Thursday, the day after the federal Office of Head Start told Mississippi Today that the group was a grantee. 

“The notification was back dated to Aug. 1,” said Rickey Lawson, communications coordinator for Delta Health Alliance. 

The organization is working quickly to offer Head Start and Early Head Start programs in Lee, Itawamba, Pontotoc and Union counties – where 465 children were previously enrolled in MAP Head Start Centers, Lawson said. 

The other three grantees did not respond to multiple requests for comment from Mississippi Today. 

U.S. Rep. Bennie Thompson, a Democrat, told Mississippi Today he is monitoring the situation and wants to make sure the transition is seamless for families. 

“Normally, when an agency has trouble, they will contact my office for assistance, but for whatever reason once I was made aware of MAP’s situation, the decision had already been reached to put it out for competition,” Thompson said. “So my effort now is to make sure that those families and employees formerly affiliated with MAP would be given the same consideration for the new agency.”