By 2014 – the year the report used for most of its comparisons – substance abuse had declined markedly, on-time high school graduation had risen dramatically and vastly more children were covered by health insurance, since 2008.
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According to the 2016 report, 51 percent of young children in MS do not attend a pre-kindergarten program, up from 48 percent in last year’s report.
Minnesota is the best state to be a kid, according to a new study of children’s overall well-being.
“Are we really content with the idea that two-thirds of America’s children are better off than Kentucky kids?”
Despite gains in some areas, Tami Silverman, president of Indiana Youth Institute, said the rate of children in poverty is troubling.
Beyond early childhood care, Southward said MS will need to find ways to expand access to higher education, so that getting a degree can become an option for more children, regardless of their family income.
The annual report looks at local data on hundreds of indicators of child well-being in four categories – economic well-being, education, health and family and community.
New data for Durham County in regards to school population were not available, but during the 2011-12 school year the daily average membership in Durham County was 32,332 – which is the average number of students in the school system on any given day.
34,000: the approximate number of Idaho children without health insurance. The rate increased from 14 percent in 2008 to 16 percent in 2014.
35 percent of children in Pennsylvania were in single-parent families in 2014, up three percentage points since 2008. The state had ranked 49th in this domain for the past four years.
If basic education funding increases next year, and in subsequent years, that will help ensure children get a quality education, whether they are coming from poor or wealthy families, he said. “These affect the economic and health outlook of all of us who live, go to school, work and pay taxes in Oklahoma”, she said.
Falgoust says there are some bright spots for Louisiana. “This trend is not about the political fighting around health care at the federal or state level”.
Alabama’s children also fared poorly in the report’s review of education indicators.
What’s partially to blame for Florida’s drop are improvements in other states that outpace Florida’s progress, said Norin Dollard, director of Florida’s Kids Count at the University of South Florida in Tampa. Also taken into account were the 36 births for every 1,000 teenagers, which has improved from 54 in 2008.
The study’s authors cited that recent policy decisions by Gov. Pat McCrory and state lawmakers and “inadequate public investment are perpetuating the status quo and are powerful barriers to advancement”.
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Taylor said racial disparities must be addressed in Wisconsin. “Still, there’s not enough growth to lift kids out of poverty”.
