A Tool Using Data to Inform a State Infant/Toddler Care Agenda

1

A Tool Using Data to Inform a State Infant/Toddler Care Agenda

Purpose of this Tool:This tool is intended for state advocates and policymakersto use as they work to develop a state infant/toddler care agenda. It includes a series of key questions to understand the context and conditions of infants and toddlers in the state. Questions include data on demographics and program participation (such as health and nutrition programs), as well as the details of child care and early education settings in the state. Where possible, links to online data sources are provided, including both original sources and organizations that have analyzed multiple datasets. By following these links, groups can find data specific to their state to populate the tool. Data may not always be available specific to children birth to age 3. In some cases, it may be useful to compare one’s own state data to that of neighboring or similar states, or to national figures that can provide context of how infants and toddlers are faring on key indicators.

Once compiled, these data couldbe analyzed to identify any trends, areas of need for policy change, and opportunities to support the case for increased investment. Groups using this tool will want to take these data into consideration along with their strategic understanding of the political opportunities within the state.This tool is one of a set of materials available through CLASP to help states identify the needs of families with infants and toddlers in their state and identify policy solutions to meet those needs.

Data in this tool is organized under the following broad questions (click to navigate directly to a section):

• Who are the children (and their families)?
• Where are children in child care and early education?
• How strong is the child care licensing/monitoring floor in your state?
• How does your state help low-income families with babies and toddlers afford quality child care

through subsidies and other mechanisms?

• How is your state thinking about improving the quality of care for babies and toddlers?

Free assistance in using this tool, and additional supporting resources, are available from CLASP. Please contact Hannah Matthews, 202-906-8006 or .

How to Use this Tool: This tool is organized as a matrix with four columns. In the first three columns, CLASP has identified a series of key questions relevant to informing an agenda for infant/toddler care; highlighted a suggested data source, including hyperlinks to online resources when possible; and provided a national data point as appropriate. Users can download and save a copy of this tool, open the tool in Microsoft Word, then fill in the last column with their state’s data. To fill in state information, click on any of the editable regions (denoted with a yellow background) and being typing. Note that users must start typing at the top of a cell in the table, but that the table will expand to accommodate all inserted text, which may flow across page lines.

Note: Much of the data in this tool is updated annually. The hyperlinks in the Data Source column strive to be specific to the data sought, yet broad enough that users can easily find the most recent data available. All data reported in the National column includes a date, which indicates the most recent data available at the time of publication of this tool. If users find that newer data have been posted for their state, they may wish to look up the newer national data as well, in order to compare the same years of data.

Other Availability: If users have need for only portions of this tool, each of the five sections is available for individual download through

Who are the children (and their families)?

Data Source / Question / National / State
See the KIDS COUNT data center. / How many children are between birth and age 3 (ages 0, 1, and 2)? How many children are in each age cohort? / In the U.S., there were about 12.8 million children between birth and age three in 2008.

• Under 1: 4.31 million
• Age 1: 4.28 million
• Age 2: 4.17 million

/ Insert data here.
Available through CLASP DataFinder. / What proportion of children under age 6 live in families with incomes under the federal poverty level (FPL)? / 20.9 percent (5,118,197) of young children, under age 6, lived in poor families in 2008. / Insert data here.
Available through CLASP DataFinder. / What proportion of children under age 6 are low-income (in families with incomes under 200 percent of FPL)? / 43.5 percent (10,637,084) of young children, under age 6, lived in low-income families in 2008. / Insert data here.
See National Center for Children in Poverty (NCCP) Early Childhood Profiles. / What is the race/ethnicity of young children under age 6? / Race/ethnicity of children, under age 6, in 2008:

• 52 percent White
• 14 percent Black or African American
• 25 percent Hispanic
• 4 percent Asian
• 3 percent Bi/Multi-Racial
• 1 percent American Indian

/ Insert data here.
See NCCP Demographic Profiles. / What percentage of young children (under age 6) in the following racial/ethnic groups are low-income? (white, black, Latino, Asian, and American Indian) / In 2008, for young children:

• 30 percent (3,928,375) of white children;
• 64 percent (2,241,011) of black children;
• 64 percent (4,091,388) of Latino children;
• 28 percent (306,990) of Asian children; and
• 69 percent (120,157) of American Indian children

were low-income. / Insert data here.
Available through CLASP DataFinder. / What proportion of children under age 6 are children of immigrants? / 25 percent (5,905,209 children) of children under age 6 lived in immigrant families (i.e., with at least one foreign-born parent) in 2008. / Insert data here.
See Migration Policy Institute Data Hub – State Profiles. / What share of the foreign-born population in the state are limited English proficient (LEP)? / 52.4 percent of the foreign-born population, age 5 and older, were LEP in 2007, compared with 51.0 percent in 2000 and 47.0 percent in 1990.
Between 2000 and 2007, the number of foreign-born persons, age five and older, in the U.S. who were LEP increased by 26.3 percent. / Insert data here.
See Migration Policy Institute Data Hub – State Profiles. / What are the primary languages spoken in households in the state after English? / In 2007, the primary language spoken in U.S. households after English was Spanish.
Approximately 62 percent of households that spoke a language other than English at home spoke Spanish, followed by Chinese at 4.4 percent and Tagalog at 2.7 percent. / Insert data here.
See NCCP Early Childhood Profiles. / What proportion of children under age 6 are exposed to three or more risk factors for young children? (Risk factors include any combination of the following: single parent, living in poverty, linguistically isolated, parents have less than a high school education, and parents have no paid employment.) / 10 percent of children under age 6 were exposed to three or more risk factors in 2008. / Insert data here.
See NCCP Early Childhood Profiles. / How many young children (under age 6) have mothers with a high school education or less? / 40 percent of young children had mothers with a high school education or less in 2008. / Insert data here.
See U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Administration for Children and Families, Child Abuse and Neglect Research, Child Maltreatment Annual Reports, Table 3-9: Age Group of Victims by State. / How many infants (under age 1) are maltreated? What is the rate per 1,000 children of infant maltreatment? How many children, ages 1 through 3, are maltreated? What is their rate of maltreatment? / In 2006, 100,142 infants under age 1 were reported as maltreated. Nationally, infants had the highest rate of child maltreatment cases at 24.4 per 1,000 children. In 2006, 172,940 children, ages 1 through 3, were maltreated, at a rate of 14.2 per 1,000 children. / Insert data here.
See U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Administration for Children and Families, Child Welfare Outcomes 2002-2005 - Report to Congress, Chapter V, State Data Pages. / What percentage of children entering foster care in 2005 were birth to age 3 (ages 0, 1, and 2)? What percentage of children in foster care at the end of the fiscal year (9/30/2005) were birth to age 3? / 33 percent of children entering foster care were birth to age 3, while about 23 percent of children in foster care at the end of the fiscal year were birth to age 3, in 2005. / Insert data here.
See the Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation State Health Facts. Note that the majority of states use the 1989 standard birth certificate but 18 states use the 2003 revised birth certificate (listed in the footnotes of the State Health Facts web page), and prenatal care data is not comparable across these two different types of birth certificates. / What percentage of mothers begin prenatal care in the first trimester? How does this percentage differ by race/ethnicity? / In 2006, for states using the 1989 standard birth certificate, the following percentages of mothers began prenatal care in the first trimester:

• Total: 83.2 percent
• White non-Hispanic: 88.1 percent
• Black non-Hispanic: 76.1 percent
• Hispanic: 77.3 percent

In 2006, for states using the 2003 revised birth certificate, the following percentages of mothers began prenatal care in the first trimester:

• Total: 69.0 percent
• White non-Hispanic: 76.2 percent
• Black non-Hispanic: 58.4 percent
• Hispanic: 57.7 percent

/ Insert data here.
See the Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation State Health Facts. / What percentage of births are financed by Medicaid? / 41 percent of births were financed by Medicaid in 2003. / Insert data here.
See the Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation State Health Facts. / What proportion of births are to teen mothers? / 42 births per 1,000 were to teen mothers (15 to 19 years old) in 2006. / Insert data here.
See National Vital Statistics Reports, Table 20 in “Births: Final Data for 2006,” Volume 57, Number 7. / What percentage of births are to unmarried mothers? / 38.5 percent (1,641,946) of births were to unmarried mothers in 2006. / Insert data here.
See the IDEA Data Accountability Center, Part C Child Count data (Table 8-1). / What proportion of infants and toddlers receive IDEA Part C services? / 2.5 percent (316,730 children) of all infants and toddlers, birth to 3, received IDEA part C services in 2007. / Insert data here.
See the IDEA Data Accountability Center, Part B Child Count data (Table 1-1). To calculate the percentage, use the estimated population data (Table C-3). / What proportion of preschoolers receive Part B? / 5.7 percent (700,166 children) of all preschoolers, ages 3 to 5, received part B services in 2007. / Insert data here.
See the KIDS COUNT data center. / What percent of children under age 6 have no health insurance? / 10 percent of children under age 6 had no health insurance in 2007. / Insert data here.
See USDA Program Data, WIC Program. For state data by age group, download the Excel (.xls) Monthly Data Agency Level file. / How many infants (under age 1) participate in WIC each month? How many children ages 1 to 5? / The average monthly WIC participation in FY 2009 was 2,224,037 infants and 4,715,251 children ages 1 to 5. / Insert data here.
See Center for Disease Control and Prevention, National Immunization Survey, Tables, Overall by State and WIC and Poverty Status by State. / What percent of all toddlers (ages 19-35 months) have received their recommended immunizations (the 4:3:1:3:3:1 series[1])? What percent of low-income toddlers? / 76 percent of all toddlers had received the series of recommended vaccines in 2008.
72 percent of low-income toddlers had received the series in 2008. / Insert data here.
See NCCP Early Childhood Profiles. / What proportion of eligible infants (under age 1) and toddlers (ages 1-2) received at least one EPSDT screen? / An 80 percent participation rate of eligible children is considered to be the national benchmark. / Insert data here.

Where are children in child care and early education?

Data Source / Question / National / State
This type of information may or may not be available in your state. Potential sources of information include your state early childhood administrators. / What proportion of infants and toddlers are in non-parental care on a regular basis and full-time? / National data from 2002 indicate that 38.1 percent of children under age 3 were in non-parental care on a regular/full-time basis.[2] / Insert data here.
See state Department of Labor. / What percentage of mothers with children under age 3 are in the labor force? / Nationwide, 60.4 percent of all mothers with children under age 3 were in the labor force in 2008.[3] / Insert data here.
See National Association of Regulatory Agencies 2007 Child Care Licensing Study, State Data Profiles, state Child Care Resource and Referral Network, or state licensing agency. / How many licensed child care center/family child care slots are in your state? How many of these slots are for infants and toddlers? / Overall, there were over 9.5 million licensed child care slots in the U.S. in 2007.[4]National data on licensed slots for infants and toddlers are not available. / Insert data here.
See CLASP In the States, Child Care State Profiles. To calculate the number of infants and toddlers served, multiply the average monthly number of children served by the percentage of children served who are infants and toddlers. / What proportion of children served with state child care assistance are infants and toddlers? How many infants and toddlers are receiving CCDBG-funded child care assistance? / 30 percent (480,090) of children served in CCDBG were infants and toddlers in an average month in 2008. / Insert data here.
See state CCDBG administrator; collected in quarterly ACF-801 reports for each family served. / In what settings are infants and toddlers cared for in CCDBG? / Of infants under age 1 receiving CCDBG: 5 percent received care in the child’s home, 32 percent in a family home, 6 percent in a group home, and 57 percent in centers in 2008.
Of toddlers between ages 1 and 3 receiving CCDBG: 4 percent received care in the child’s home, 27 percent in a family home, 6 percent in a group home, and 63 percent in centers in 2008.[5] / Insert data here.
See state CCDBG administrator; collected in quarterly ACF-801 reports for each family served. / How many hours are infants and toddlers who are receiving CCDBG subsidies in care? / Children under age 1 spent an average of 159 hours per month in care paid for by the subsidy in 2008.
For children between ages 1 and 2, the average was 166, and for children between ages2 and 3, the average was 168 in 2008.[6] / Insert data here.
Available through CLASP DataFinder. For additional information on Head Start, seeCLASP In the States,Head Start by the Numbers profiles. / How many infants and toddlers and pregnant women are in the federal Early Head Start program? / In 2008, there were 728 federal Early Head Start grantees/ delegates, which served 85,211 children and 10,114 pregnant women. / Insert data here.
This type of information may or may not be available in your state. Potential sources of information include your state early childhood administrators, CCDBG plan, Early Childhood Comprehensive Systems (ECCS) plan, Child Care Resource and Referral Network, or state Early Learning Advisory Council. / How many infants and toddlers are in legally unlicensed child care with family, friend, or neighbor caregivers? / Insert data here.
This type of information may or may not be available in your state. Potential sources of information include your state early childhood administrators, CCDBG plan, Early Childhood Comprehensive Systems (ECCS) plan, Child Care Resource and Referral Network, or state Early Learning Advisory Council. / Are there any additional programs where infants and toddlers are cared for during the day operating under state initiatives? How many children are served? / Insert data here.
This type of information may or may not be available in your state. Potential sources of information include your state early childhood administrators, CCDBG plan, Early Childhood Comprehensive Systems (ECCS) plan, Child Care Resource and Referral Network, or state Early Learning Advisory Council. / Is any data available in your state showing where infants and toddlers live, particularly those who are low-income? Has any agency mapped where licensed slots are as compared to where infants of different income levels live? / Insert data here.

How strong is the child care licensing/monitoring floor in your state?

Data Source / Question / National / State
See National Association of Regulatory Agencies (NARA) 2007 Child Care Licensing Study, State Data Profiles or state licensing agency. / When was the last time state licensing regulations were reviewed and/or changed in your state? / 15 states revised their child care center regulations in 2006, and 12 states did so in 2007. 12 states revised small family child care home regulations in 2006 and 9 did so in 2007. 10 states revised large/group FCC home regulations in 2006 and 7 did so in 2007. / Insert data here.
See NARA 2007 Child Care Licensing State Data Profiles or state licensing agency. / What are the required provider:child ratios and group sizes, by age, for children under 3 in licensed center care? / Caring for Our Children standards[7] for center-based care by age are:

• Birth-12 months – 1:3 ratio, max. group size of 6
• 13-30 months – 1:4 ratio, max. group size of 8
• 31-35 months – 1:5 ratio, max. group size of 10

/ Insert data here.
See NARA 2007 Child Care Licensing State Data Profiles or state licensing agency. / What is the threshold number of children a family child care provider may care for before licensing is required? / In 2007, ten states required family child care homes to be licensed if one unrelated child is in care. / Insert data here.
See NARA 2007 Child Care Licensing State Data Profiles or state licensing agency. / What are the ratios and group sizes required for licensed family child care homes, when any children under age 3 are present? / Many states have a matrix in which group size depends on the ages of all the children in a provider’s care. In 2007, 13 states either capped maximum group size for family child care homes at six or did so if children under age 3 were present.[8] / Insert data here.
See NARA 2007 Child Care Licensing State Data Profiles or state licensing agency. / Does your state regulate the level of training or education that a licensed child care provider must have prior to caring for children of any age in a center? In a family child care home? If so, what are the requirements? / 39 states have some pre-service requirements for center providers and 24 states have some pre-service requirements for FCC providers.[9] Such requirements vary; some states require only a high-school degree/GED, other states may require some amount of experience, specific training in early childhood education for a set number of clock hours, or a CDA credential. / Insert data here.
See NARA 2007 Child Care Licensing State Data Profiles or state licensing agency. / Does your state regulate what ongoing training is required for a licensed provider caring for children of any agein a center or family child care home? If so, what are the requirements? / 48 states require ongoing training hours for center providers and 38 states require ongoing training hours for FCC providers.[10] / Insert data here.
See NARA 2007 Child Care Licensing State Data Profiles or state licensing agency. / Does your state have additional regulations specifically for child care staff working with infants and toddlers, either in centers or licensed family child care homes? / In 2007, 17 states had specific requirements for staff working with for infants and toddlers in centers.[11] National data not available on requirements for licensed family child care providers caring for infants and toddlers. / Insert data here.
See NARA 2007 Child Care Licensing State Data Profiles or state licensing agency. / How often are licensed centers and family child care homes monitored? / In 2007, 15 states monitored centers more than once a year, and 10 states monitored family child care homes more than once a year. / Insert data here.
See NARA 2007 Child Care Licensing State Data Profiles or state licensing agency. / What is the average caseload of a licensor in your state? / In 2007, the average caseload of licensed facilities that a line staff licensor must handle across the country was 108:1. Six states had caseloads of 50 or fewer facilities per line staff licensor. / Insert data here.
See state licensing agency. / What information is available on licensing compliance by age group of children in care in your state? / Insert data here.

How does your state help low-income families with babies and toddlers