Social problems and attempts to tackle them - OCR AThe Great Society – education, work, homes and the environment

Education

Several new laws were passed to improve equality in education:

• The 1965 Elementary and Secondary Education Act was the first time the federal government made any significant changes to state education. Its aim was to make the standard of education between different states more equal.
• The Head Start programme, costing $1.5 billion, was introduced to enable teachers to provide extra teaching to children from low income backgrounds.
• The 1965 Higher Education Act provided more money to enable universities to offer scholarships to poorer students.

Work

The 1964 Economic Opportunity Act created a number of schemes to help the poorest people living in America. These included:

• the Jobs Corps to help train young people for work
• the Neighborhood Youth Corps, which provided training and work for poor young people living in cities
• money to support work experience opportunities
• loans to help people start their own businesses

These schemes were overseen by the Office of Economic Opportunity.

Homes and the environment

Living conditions in American cities contributed to poverty. This was because people would often struggle to find work due to long-term medical issues they had developed as a result of their living conditions. A number of new laws were passed to tackle this problem.

• The 1965 Motor Vehicle Air Pollution Control Act and the 1965 Water Quality Act aimed to improve the environment.
• The 1965 Housing and Urban Development Act provided subsidised rent for poorer people.
• The 1966 Model Cities Program provided money for poor-quality housing to be improved or replaced.