Sec. 2. Findings
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Congress finds the following: Between 2007 and 2009, the number of children in the United States living in poverty increased by 2,200,000, to 15,500,000 children. According to the National Center for Children in Poverty, the number of poor children under age 6 increased by 24 percent between 2000 and 2007. The Center also found that, in Iowa, 20 percent of children under age 6 live in poor families. According to the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), in 2008, the United States had a child poverty rate of 20.6 percent, making the United States the OECD nation with the fourth worst level of child poverty.
Of the 4 most developed countries in the world, the United States has the highest rate of child poverty. According to the National Center for Children in Poverty, at age 4, children who live below the poverty line are 18 months below normal learning and achievement for their age group, and by age 10 that gap is still present. For children living in the poorest families, the gap is even larger. Children from low-income families are more likely to have low levels of school engagement, to be chronically absent from school, to have emotional and behavioral problems, and to live in stressful home environments.
By age 3, children in low-income homes will have heard one-third as many words as children in middle-income and high-income homes. Studies show that children who attend high-quality early childhood education programs are less likely to repeat grades, less likely to be assigned to special education, and more likely to perform better on standardized tests, experience reduced rates of teenage pregnancy, and graduate from high school. Additionally, such children are less likely to engage in criminal behavior and more likely to obtain employment at higher wages.
Economically disadvantaged children gain even larger benefits from such high-quality programs. Compared with children in kindergarten from low-income families, children in kindergarten from high-income families live in homes with 3 times the number of books and such children are 4 times as likely to have a computer at home. Children from high-income families also watch far less television and are more likely to visit museums or libraries. By the time children from low-income families enter kindergarten, they are already 3 months behind the national average in reading and mathematics skills, a gap that persists through high school.
A child from a middle-income family typically enters first grade with about 1,000 hours of one-on-one picture book reading time with parents, other relatives, or teachers, but a child from a low-income family averages less than 100 hours of such reading time. The percentage of households with children reporting food insecurity (limited or uncertain access to nutritious, safe foods) increased by 25 percent between 2007 and 2008. Poor nutrition is linked to behavioral problems, lower educational performance, and delayed socio-emotional development.
Twenty-nine percent of high-achieving 8th graders from low-income families complete college. This is the same rate of college completion as low-achieving 8th graders from high-income families. About one-fourth of all students who start 9th grade will not graduate 4 years later. For African-American and Latino students, that figure increases to 40 percent. A 16- to 24-year-old coming from a high-income family is about 7 times as likely to have completed high school as a 16- to 24-year-old coming from a low-income family.
The average annual cost to incarcerate a youth in the United States is approximately $88,000, while per pupil annual spending for a student in kindergarten through grade 12 is $10,000.