Major Regional Differences In Children’s Education, Economic Security, Health and Safety.

In a comprehensive collection of county by county data and statewide trends, a new report details a conclusive, systematic connection between California children’s success or failure in school and the economic security, health, safety and early care foundation which underlies it.

California Report Card 2001 and California County Data Book 2001 were released today by Children Now, a child research and action organization; they contain the most up-to-date measures of how children and families are doing across the state. Overall, the report found that schools will not be able to accomplish the widely-held desire to improve children’s education without concurrent improvement in the state’s inadequate system of early care and education, low access to health care and the high rate of child poverty.

Among the statewide findings affecting school success, new data reveal that:

Child care is now one of the largest family expenditures, with full-time toddler care costing more than 50% of fair market rent (FMR) for a two-bedroom apartment in almost every county. Nearly two thirds of California mothers are in the paid workforce; meanwhile, 280,000 children who need subsidized child care are not receiving it due to under-funding. Availability of quality early care and education reduces the likelihood that a child will repeat a grade, drop out of school or be placed in special education.

One out of every five children (1.85 million) has no health insurance, ranking California’s rate of uninsured children the seventh highest in the nation. Untreated health problems result in missed school days and diminished participation and learning in class.

Almost half (47%) of all California school-age children live in families with low incomes and one fifth (20%) of all children live in poor families, the sixth highest rate in the nation.* California also ranks sixth among states in income inequality, despite a sustained period of record economic prosperity. The study reports that when parents’ income improves, their children stay in school and complete more education.
A subsidized after school program is available to less than half of all five- to fourteen-year-olds in low-income families. After school programs provide a safe haven during a peak crime period and can improve children’s academic performance.

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REGIONAL DATA:

View Bay Area Highlights
http://www.childrennow.org/california/rc-2001/bayarea.cfm

View Los Angeles Highlights
http://www.childrennow.org/california/rc-2001/losangeles.cfm

View Central Valley Highlights
http://www.childrennow.org/california/rc-2001/centralvalley.cfm

REPORTS:

View the California Report Card 2001 (HTML)
http://www.childrennow.org/california/rc-2001/reportcard-2001.htm

View the California Report Card 2001 (PDF) 556k
http://www.childrennow.org/california/rc-2001/reportcard.pdf

View the California County Data Book 2001 (PDF) 920k
http://www.childrennow.org/california/rc-2001/databook-2001.pdf

CHARTS (all in PDF):

View the Statewide Poverty Under Age 18 Chart (929k)
http://www.childrennow.org/california/rc-2001/statemap.pdf

View the Children Without Health Insurance Chart (656k)
http://www.childrennow.org/california/rc-2001/without-ins.pdf

View the Contra Costa County 2000 API Scores Chart (8k)
http://www.childrennow.org/california/rc-2001/api-ba.pdf

View the Fresno County 2000 API Scores Chart (8k)
http://www.childrennow.org/california/rc-2001/api-cv.pdf

View the Los Angeles County 2000 API Scores Chart (8k)
http://www.childrennow.org/california/rc-2001/api-la.pdf

“While it is certainly important to continue to improve the quality of our public schools, this report establishes the many ways in which success in school is linked to a child’s health, economic security and early care and education,” said Amy Dominguez-Arms, vice president of Children Now.

“Understanding the connection between what’s happening in a child’s life both inside and outside the classroom presents policy makers and business leaders with a new opportunity to take action for the next generation,” Dominguez-Arms said.

Data for all 58 California counties was collected on 40 different education, economic, health and safety indicators to give detailed local and statewide representations of children’s lives, including high school dropouts, teacher experience, parents’ education, foster care, child abuse, incarcerated juveniles and gun & motor vehicle injuries and deaths. Significant differences emerged at the county level. For example:

The widest gaps between the lowest and highest student test scores are in the Los Angeles, San Francisco Bay Area and Fresno regions. Differences in schools’ Academic Performance Index (API) scores within the same county are strongly correlated to the proportion of low-income children attending each school.

In Los Angeles County, 75% of teachers are fully credentialed (a decline from 79% three years ago) whereas in San Diego County, 95% of teachers have their full teaching credential (an improvement from 88% three years ago).

The Central Valley continues to have some of the highest child poverty rates, with six of eight counties in the bottom quarter of counties with children in poverty statewide. The number of young children in poverty varies significantly from 7.3% in Marin County to 60.7% in Imperial County.

Despite showing small improvements in a number of child health areas, the Inland Empire counties of Riverside and San Bernardino both scored in the bottom third of ranked counties across all four health measures of first trimester prenatal care, low birthweight infants, teen births and infant mortality; San Bernardino County had the highest rate for infant mortality in the state.

The report makes recommendations to address the different factors influencing school success, including:

Assure access to high quality child care for infants and toddlers and promote the expansion of high quality pre-school programs so that every three- and four-year-old has the opportunity to participate. Research confirms that this would result in more children arriving in the classroom ready to learn.

Close the gaps between low- and high-performing schools by allocating financial resources to this goal. Other recommendations include continuing financial and other incentives for additional well-prepared and experienced teachers to teach and remain in schools serving disadvantaged students and assessing the new school reward system for its impact on such schools.

Enact a state Earned Income Credit for low-income working families similar to that in fifteen other states. A state credit worth 25% of the existing federal one would help lift 92,000 California children out of poverty.

Simplify eligible families’ enrollment into subsidized health coverage such as Healthy Families and Medi-Cal and help them maintain coverage by addressing administrative obstacles that result in lost health insurance.

Expand the supply of high quality after school programs to help improve children’s safety and enrich their social and academic learning potential.

* Federal poverty level (“poor”) is $17,650 or less for a family of four; “low-income” is 185% of FPL ($32,653 or less).