Art Enrichment: Evaluating a Collaboration Between Head Start and a Graduate Art Therapy Program

Abstract

Head Start, a U.S. federally funded program, prepares children for school through early childhood intervention in social–emotional and cognitive arenas. This article describes program evaluation survey results from the past 5 years of an 18-year collaboration between a university graduate art therapy program and 8 Head Start centers. Graduate art therapy students provided weekly art enrichment for children who were referred by their teachers to work on individualized social–emotional goals. End-of-year surveys documented the Head Start teachers’ and coordinators’ observations of positive social–emotional behavioral changes in the 5 areas of verbal communication, impulse control, interaction with peers, attention span, and self-esteem. The program received high ratings overall and particularly for the graduate art therapy students’ coordination of interventions.

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