标题：Root Shock Revisited: Perspectives of Early Head Start Mothers on Community and Policy Environments and Their Effects on Child Health, Development, and School Readiness
摘要：Racial differences in school readiness are a form of health disparity. By examining, from the perspective of low-income minority families participating in an Early Head Start study, community and policy environments as they shape and inform lived experiences, we identified several types of social and economic dislocation that undermine the efforts of parents to ready their children for school. The multiple dislocations of community triggered by housing and welfare reform and “urban renewal” are sources of stress for parents and children and affect the health and development of young children. Our findings suggest that racial differences in school readiness result not from race but from poverty and structural racism in American society. It was more families there. Here it is pretty much individuals. They don't interact as neighbors. They act as enemies. I don't have very many friends here. So it's hard, like, [I can't ask] “What was it like when your daughter went to kindergarten?” You can't do that here. —Mother involved in Early Head Start study who was relocated by HOPE VI SCHOOL READINESS IS AT the heart of current debate on the health and development of young children. Policy discussions focus on the supposed lack of readiness of children in low-income and minority families and on racial and economic “readiness gaps.” 1 In a previous article, we addressed these issues by privileging the voices of low-income, predominantly African American parents to discern meanings of school readiness for them and their efforts to ready their children for school. 2 What remained unexamined were community and policy influences on school readiness as experienced by study families. In this article, we elaborate on this theme by suggesting new directions in public health research intended to eliminate health disparities.
