Recorded on: September 2023

Our attorneys have been training Head Start programs on the ERSEA (Eligibility, Recruitment, Selection, Enrollment and Attendance) requirements for many years. Our trainings have covered an overview of all the requirements, but after each training event we often have multiple follow-up questions on just how to implement and apply the rules. Some ERSEA provisions are intricate and tricky, but even when the language seems straightforward, difficulties arise when applying that language to the countless real-life situations.

The ERSEA requirements seem to cause a great deal of anxiety for a number of reasons. First, eligibility requirements gained even more emphasis after the 2010 GAO Report that encouraged the Head Start community to make sure that staff understood the nature and seriousness of the eligibility determination process. A 2019 GAO Report reemphasized the importance of eligibility as well as how programs track enrollment and attendance. The Office of Head Start has issued the Full Enrollment Initiative, ACF-PI-HS-18-04, which has placed more pressure on Head Start programs to work even harder to maintain full enrollment or risk facing huge financial consequences.

Over the years, we have logged the many ERSEA questions we have received, and, in this series, we will review the answers to those thorny questions that might be keeping you up at night as well as responses to the questions you didn’t even know you had.