In Chile, a head start
This is the 10th in a series of stories about Harvard’s engagement in Latin America. COBQUECURA, Chile — “We’ve got to break the horrible cycle of poverty and the huge disparities between the rich and the poor,” said Judith Palfrey, Harvard’s T. Berry Brazelton Professor of Pediatrics, speaking on a sunny afternoon in this coastal town that is still recovering from a massive earthquake and tsunami in 2010. Palfrey was visiting the area as part of an ongoing Harvard collaboration aimed at boosting economic equality through a comprehensive early education program. In 2006, the Chilean nongovernmental agency Fundación Educacional Oportunidad (FEO), the Harvard Graduate School of Education (HGSE), and the Harvard Medical School (HMS) joined with several Chilean municipalities to develop a program based on the United States’ early childhood initiative Head Start. Un Buen Comienzo (UBC), “A Good Beginning,” promotes family support, as well as health, socio-emotional, literacy, and language interventions in...