State Stack Up in Early Childhood Development

So this is a little late in my plans on posting, but here is an interesting quick find way to examine how your state stacks up in early childhood development. It looks at specific age groups, but ranks states based on the zero to 18 age bracket.

It looks at things like the population in this age group like: childcare, unemployed families, low income levels, screenings, size of babies at birth, immunizations, loss of jobs, reading with children, intervention, and federal care. It also ranks the states with the top 9 being:

Massachusetts
Vermont
Iowa
New Hampshire
Minnesota
North Dakota
Connecticut
New Jersey
Virginia

The Last 5 in well-being for children 0-18 are:

46. Arizona
47. Louisianan
48. Nevada
49. New Mexico
50. Mississippi

As you can see, there is also national numbers on these data. So although Mississippi has a lower population than Massachusetts, it still falls behind in lots of the ares. Some important things to note from looking at these child development fact sheets. Poverty matters. Programs matter. Reading with your children matters. So although some of the information applies directly to the state, it also can be changed by the parent. This means we not only need to elect government officials that fight for this next generation. We also need to help steer the population ourselves.

If you are interested, go check out your states date. There are four pages worth of information, so it’s not only ranking child well-being by state. It is also showing you what these ranks are based on and what we can do better to improve the lives of our children.