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Michigan continues to fall behind when it comes to the well-being of its children, landing in the bottom third of states.
That is the most important conclusion from the Kids Count Data Book 2024 from the Annie E. Casey Foundation. Now in its 35th year, the 50-state report of recent analyzes of household data 16 indicators in four domains – economic well-being, education, health care, and family and community factors – and then ranks the states based on how children are faring overall.
And the latest data says they’re not doing so well post-pandemic Michigan ranks 34th in the nation for overall child well-being, dropping two spots from the 2023 report.
But according to Anne Kuhnen, Kids Count policy director for the Michigan League for Public Policy (MLPP), the most alarming numbers involved education, where Michigan ranked 41st out of 50 based on most recent available school year data (2021-2022). It was Michigan’s worst ranking.
“We have less than half of 3 and 4 year olds in kindergarten, only 1 in 1 of fourth graders are proficient in reading, the same goes for math in eighth grade,” she told the paper. Michigan Progress. “I think there is a worrying decline when we look at the share of high school students who are not graduating on time. We have had improvements in this area for almost a decade, so it is disappointing to see this deteriorating.”
Specifically, 1 in 5 students in Michigan did not graduate from high school on time, while 72% of fourth graders scored below proficiency in reading in 2022 – an increase of 6% from 2019 – while 75% of eighth graders in 2022 scored below proficiency in math – up 9% from 2019.
On top of that, there is a 40% chronic absenteeism rate, with more than half a million Michigan students chronically absent in the 2021-2022 school year, well above the national rate of 30%. And if that wasn’t bad enough, there were significant disparities by race, with more than half of Native American and black children chronically absent.
Monique Stanton, president and CEO of MLPP, said that as bad as these statistics are, they really shouldn’t be a surprise, considering that school absenteeism is linked to childhood poverty and trauma.
“Here in Michigan, 18% of our state’s children live in poverty, which is slightly above the national average, and nearly half of our state’s children have experienced at least one adverse childhood experience,” Stanton said. “These findings underscore the importance of strengthening Michigan families and reducing child poverty through bold state policy decisions so that all our children have the solid foundation they need to be present and successful in their classrooms.”
But Kuhnen says the report wasn’t all bad news. Michigan’s best ranking was again in health, at 22, up from 26 last year.
“The big reason for that, the big indicator that tells us that children’s health may be at a peak, is the low number of children who don’t have health insurance,” she said. “In Michigan, only 3% of all children have no health insurance, and that is among the best in the country.”
Another positive trend that continues to move in the right direction is teen births, which Kuhnen says have declined over the past fifteen years.
“That’s very positive because we know how difficult that can be for both babies and pregnant mothers,” she said. “In the family community sector, Michigan ranks 28th, which is slightly below average, and while that’s not great, it’s moving in the right direction.”
However, when it comes to economic well-being, Michigan ranks 31st. While that’s up one spot from last year, the state continues to face significant challenges: More than half a million children live in homes where neither parent has a full-time, year-round job, and 1 in 4 children live in households that spend more. than 30% of their income on housing.
Kuhnen said this brings us full circle to the report’s bleak picture of Michigan education.
“Students don’t come to school ready to learn because they don’t have safe housing or enough to eat. They don’t have a safe way to get to school,” she said. “In many cases, they just don’t have access to many of the resources they need, including things like mental health care, where we saw the pandemic has really increased anxiety among young people.”
One thing that Kuhnen said would go a long way toward providing the kind of economic security many families need is paid family and medical leave in Michigan.
A 2018 effort to advance a ballot initiative to provide mandatory paid family leave was defeated by the then Republican Party-controlled legislature when it used the “assume and change” strategy to dilute what would have been 72 hours of paid time per year up to 40 hours, but only for companies with more than 50 employees.
Since then, legislation has passed to provide workers across the state with up to 15 weeks of paid leave stagnated in the committeewho has not yet received a hearing.
Despite poor education outcomes, the report says the pandemic is not the only cause.
“The COVID-19 pandemic has caused serious academic damage by closing schools and separating students from their physical learning environments. An unprecedented decline in fourth-grade reading and math proficiency among students in the United States between 2019 and 2022 led to decades of lost progress,” the report said. “But alarm bells have been ringing for some time among teachers, researchers, policymakers and employers who monitor the academic readiness of students. It is time to not only listen, but also act.”
With that in mind, the Annie E. Casey Foundation has made five recommendations:
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Continue to have access to universal free meals and ensure you have a reliable internet connection, a place to study and time with friends, teachers and counselors.
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Expand access to intensive tutoring for students who are behind in their classes and missing academic milestones. Research has shown that the most effective guidance is personal, in high doses and directly linked to the school.
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States should take advantage of all their allocated pandemic relief funding to prioritize the social, emotional, academic, and physical well-being of students. As long as the funds are obligated before the September 30 deadline, states should have two full years to spend them.
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States and school systems must address chronic absenteeism so that more students return to learn. While few states collect and report chronic absenteeism data by grade, all should do so. Improving attendance tracking and data will inform future decision making. Lawmakers should embrace a positive approach rather than criminalizing students or parents for attendance issues because they may not understand the consequences of even a few missed days.
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Policymakers should invest in community colleges, public schools that provide comprehensive supports for children and families. Natural homes for tutoring, mental health, nutritional assistance and other services, community schools use innovative and creative programs to support young learners and encourage parental involvement, leading to better outcomes for children.
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