LAKE COUNTY ? Children”s health and general welfare is the focus of the annual California Report Card, a statewide study published by Children Now. The 2009 report card was released Jan. 6, and the statewide results are mixed when compared to Lake County.
Standing up for children in Lake County and statewide is the sole focus of Children Now, a state non-profit organization that publishes an annual report on children”s issues. The non-partisan children”s advocacy and research organization analyzes state data for the report and assigns letter grades in the areas including health, education, obesity, and child safety. Part of the process is pushing policy in Sacramento aimed at improving children”s welfare.
“We are working hard to try to make sure children are not harmed in the budget considerations. Last year, unfortunately we were not as successful as we initially thought. Now our goal is asking policy makers in the next legislative session to restore children”s health and welfare, and repair the damage that was done because of budget cuts,” Children Now Senior Policy Associate of Research Jessica Mindnich said.
Lake County Superintendent of Schools Dave Geck noted that county and state schools are struggling to provide quality education because of the state”s fiscal crisis.
“It”s tragic in the sense of the discrepancy between how much funding is allocated to California”s schools on average and what happens in the United States. It”s hard for California to stay on track and deliver quality education when the system is under-funding it,” Geck said.
According to the 2009 Children Now report card, California ranks 46th in the nation in per pupil spending. The report says based on 2007-08 data, the state average is $7,081, which is 21 percent less than the national average.
According to information found at the California Department of Education”s Web site, www.cde.ca.gov, Lake County schools spent an average of $6,654 per pupil during the 2006-07 school year.
Another issue the report focuses on is health insurance coverage, and California got a D-plus. According to Mindnich, 95 percent of Lake County”s children had medical insurance. The report says approximately 95 percent of the state”s children younger than 5 have health insurance, and 92 percent of children between ages 6 and 18 are insured.
Statewide, the number of uninsured children may rise over 1 million because of families losing job-based coverage, according to Mindnich. As of October, Lake County”s unemployment rate was 11.2 percent a 46 percent rise from 2007.
One area where Lake County is below the state average is preschool education. According to Mindnich, 48 percent of the state”s 4-year-olds attend preschool. In Lake County, 38 percent of the children that age attend preschool.
The organization draws from sources such as the California Department of Education, the California Healthy Interview Survey, the California Healthy Kids Survey and the American Communities Survey.
Contact Tiffany Revelle at trevelle@record-bee.com, or call her directly at 263-5636 ext. 37.
