Race for Results Report Identifies Need to Create More Opportunity for Success for all Children, Especially Those of Color
Patrick McCarthy, President and CEO, Annie E. Casey Foundation and Laura Speer, Associate Director for Policy Reform Advocacy at the Annie E. Casey Foundation
(Baltimore, MD, Tuesday, April 1, 2014) – America’s future prosperity depends on our ability to prepare all children to achieve their full potential in life. Amid rapid demographic changes, a new report from the Annie E. Casey Foundation shows we have much ground to cover to ensure that all kids – especially children of color – are positioned to thrive.
The KIDS COUNT policy report, Race for Results: Building a Path to Opportunity for All Children, unveils the new Race for Results index, which compares how children are progressing on key milestones across racial and ethnic groups at the national and state level. The data can assist leaders who create policies and programs that benefit all children, and identify areas where targeted strategies and investments are needed.
By 2018, children of color will represent the majority of children in the United States. The report highlights serious concerns that African-American, Latino, Native American and some subgroups of Asian-American children face profound barriers to success and calls for an urgent, multi-sector approach to develop solutions.
The index is based on 12 indicators that measure a child’s success in each stage of life, from birth to adulthood. The indicators were chosen based on the goal that all children should grow up in economically successful families, live in supportive communities and meet developmental, health and educational milestones. To compare results across the areas in the index, the indicators are grouped into four areas: early childhood; education and early work; family supports; and neighborhood context.
Overall, the index shows that at the national level, no one racial group has all children meeting all milestones. Using a single composite score placed on a scale of one (lowest) to 1,000 (highest), Asian and Pacific Islander children have the highest index score at 776 followed by white children at 704. Scores for Latino (404), American-Indian (387) and African-American (345) children are distressingly lower, and this pattern holds true in nearly every state.
For African-American children, the situation is dire. In general, states in the Rust Belt and the Mississippi Delta are places where opportunity for black children is poorest. African-American kids face the greatest barriers to success in Michigan, Mississippi and Wisconsin.
The report finds there are clear differences in the extent to which barriers to success exist for different subgroups of Asian children and for Latinos. Although Asian-American children scored the highest on the well-being indicators, children of Southeast Asian descent (Burmese, Hmong, Laotian, Cambodian and Vietnamese) face barriers on the pathway to economic stability. For Latinos, kids from Mexico and Central America face the biggest barriers to success.
The report makes four policy recommendations to help ensure that all children and their families achieve their full potential:
- Gather and analyze racial and ethnic data to inform polices and decision making;
- Utilize data and impact assessment tools to target investments to yield the greatest impact for children of color;
- Develop and implement promising and proven programs and practices focused on improving outcomes for children and youth of color; and
- Integrate strategies that explicitly connect vulnerable groups to new jobs and opportunities in economic and workforce development.