This report provides a summary of and recommendations from a study which investigated the cost structure of 16 Head Start grantees and delegate agencies. The study came about when the Office of Evaluation and Technical Analysis, Office of the Assistant Secretary for Planning and Evaluation, Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS) issued a basic ordering agreement to Aurora Associates, Inc., and Westat, Inc. to conduct a series of short-term, management-oriented studies of DHHS programs. (The task order discussed in this final report is the second resulting from the 1981-82 basic ordering agreement.) Following an executive summary of the study, its conceptual framework, and its plan (including descriptions of site selection and visits, the sample, and instruments used), a detailed discussion of the study's results, organized around six study questions, is presented, and the potential use of such information in a national examination of Head Start grantee and delegate costs is discussed. Finally, means of facilitating an examination of program costs across all Head Start grantees are recommended. A copy of the study's instruments, summary tables of the data gathered, and responses to the draft of the final report from programs in the sample are appended. (MP)