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The Expanded Food and Nutrition Education Program (EFNEP) is the nation's first federal nutrition education program for low-income populations. Without question, accelerating equity in programming has long been a priority of EFNEP. Historically underserved populations with limited financial resources are often people of color and at increased risk for diet-related diseases. EFNEP contributes to nutrition security as program families and youths gained knowledge and skills for healthier food and physical activity choices, increased food resource management (shopping and food preparation), food safety, and improved food security practices to keep healthy in challenging times. Consistent with previous years, adult and youth participants in FY 2022 reported improved behaviors following program involvement. More than 90% of adult EFNEP participants reported improvement in what they ate. National EFNEP priorities for FY 2022 included facilitating workforce development, increasing program reach, and increasing appropriate use of technology in teaching. This report reflects how EFNEP continues to make a difference in the lives of low-income families and youths, even and especially in times of adversity. [For the 2021 report, see ED623567.]

The annual National Deafblind Child Count is the world's first and longest-running count of children who are deafblind. Begun in 1986 on behalf of the U.S. Department of Education, it represents a collaborative effort between the National Center on Deafblindness (NCDB) and state deafblind projects throughout the country, including those in the Pacific Trust territories, the Virgin Islands, and Puerto Rico. The annual child count helps identify state and national technical assistance needs for children who are deafblind, their families, and the providers and systems that serve them. Each year, state deafblind projects capture a point-in-time count of the number of children eligible for project services on December 1 as well as information about the special education services those children receive under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA), Part B or C. IDEA Part C covers early intervention for infants and toddlers with disabilities. IDEA Part B covers children and youth ages 3-21. The official count used in this report is the number of children eligible for state deafblind project services on December 1. NCDB provides technical assistance to the state projects to help them conduct their counts and compiles the data into this national report.

The 34th edition of the Annie E. Casey Foundation's KIDS COUNT® Data Book describes how the country's lack of affordable and accessible child care negatively affects children, families and U.S. businesses. This year's publication continues to present national and state data across four domains--economic well-being, education, health and family and community--and ranks states in overall child well-being. The report includes pre-pandemic figures as well as more recent statistics, and shares the latest information of its kind available. [Foreword by Lisa M. Hamilton. For "KIDS COUNT Data Book, 2022: State Trends in Child Well-Being," see ED625969.]

The 33rd edition of the Annie E. Casey Foundation's KIDS COUNT® Data Book describes how children in America are in the midst of a mental health crisis, struggling with anxiety and depression at unprecedented levels. This year's publication continues to present national and state data across four domains -- economic well-being, education, health and family and community -- and ranks states in overall child well-being. The report includes pre-pandemic figures as well as more recent statistics, and shares the latest information of its kind available. [The foreword is written by Lisa M. Hamilton. For "KIDS COUNT Data Book, 2021: State Trends in Child Well-Being," see ED613636.]

Our children, and our nation, face new challenges in our increasingly digital world. The following report makes the case for building greater resilience against the growing problems of misinformation and disinformation by equipping our teachers and students with the tools and skills they need to face and understand those problems. It begins with an exploration of the history of various terms and concepts, from media and digital literacy to digital citizenship and civics to cybersecurity awareness. The report finds that their respective treatments of skills, ethics, and threats is crucially needed--and that they now cross at what might be conceived of as "cyber citizenship." This conceptual intersection allows a new kind of coalition-building, drawing together groups in fields that range from education to public interest technology to national security, who all now share an interest in tackling these challenges. The report explores nascent research on the efficacy of such programming and the challenges of implementing them in schools in the United States. It describes the recent growth in new tools and sites for educators to teach such skills--but also highlights the problem of finding and comparing these resources. To tackle this problem, the report describes a forthcoming cyber citizenship portal for educators and offers a series of recommendations for policymakers and philanthropies alike. It concludes with a vision of what success might look like: a world in which our children and society are equipped to succeed in 21st century life, with resilience against the information threats that so challenge us now. And we conclude with a diagram of an emerging network of organizations as well as a vision for building skills and mindsets for cyber citizenship. [This report was funded by Cyber Florida.]

Two studies examined factors that predicted children's tendencies to match objects versus relations across scenes when no instruction was given. Study 1 examined a) age and b) nationality as a proxy for cultural differences in experiences with relations. The results showed that Chinese and U.S. children across ages all showed an initial bias to match objects versus relations across scenes. However, older children in both regions were more likely to notice features of the task that indicated relational matches were a more reliable solution and shifted their responding toward relations over time. Study 2 replicated the object mapping bias and age effects within U.S. children while also examining the impact of directly manipulating children's relational experiences. Before the main scene mapping task children did a relation-generation task known to prime attention to relations (Simms & Richland, 2019). This did not override the initial bias toward object mapping, but magnified the role of age, making older children increasingly sensitive to task features that prompted relational matches, further shifting their responding toward relations over time. [This paper will be published in "Journal of Experimental Child Psychology."]

COVID-19 lockdowns have significantly disrupted the daily lives of children and adolescents, with increased?time at home, online learning and limited physical social interaction. This report seeks to understand the immediate effects on their mental health. Covering more than 130,000 children and adolescents across 22 countries, the evidence shows?increased stress,?anxiety and depressive?symptoms, as well as increased alcohol and substance use, and externalizing behavioural problems. Children and adolescents?also reported?positive coping strategies, resilience, social connectedness through digital media, more family?time, and?relief from academic stress. Factors such as demographics, relationships and pre-existing conditions are critical. To ensure children and adolescents are supported, the report recommends building the evidence on the longer-term impact of the pandemic on child and adolescent mental health in low- and middle-income countries, including vulnerable populations.

The assessment of psychosocial strengths in children and adolescents has predominately focused on the measurement of single traits and constructs, such as grit (Christopoulou, Lakioti, Pezirkianidis, Karakasidou, & Stalikas, 2018), optimism (Oberle, Guhn, Gadermann, Thomson, & Schonert-Reichl, 2018), hope (Pedrotti, 2018), and gratitude (Gottlieb & Froh, 2019). Although there is substantial value in assessing and evaluating the beneficial correlates of individual constructs, we suggest that a whole-child paradigm (Alford & White, 2015) provides an optimal rationale supporting the use of comprehensive measures of psychosocial strengths. Strength-based measures have a clinical purpose when used by school psychologists as part of an individual child psycho-educational assessment, but we suggest that such measures have even greater utility when used to provide comprehensive information about psychosocial strengths of "all" students within the ecological context of local education agencies. In our chapter, we focus on strength-based tools developed for schoolwide universal screening. A second consideration that guides this chapter is that psychosocial strengths-based assessment has critical benefit and scientific rationale when grounded in a sound conceptual model that offers an understanding of the process and factors associated with quality of life outcomes among adolescents. [This will be a chapter in: "Handbook of Positive Psychology Assessment: Psychological Assessment -- Science and Practice." European Association of Psychological Assessment (EAPA). Preparation of this chapter was supported in part by a research grant from by the Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness.]

The objective of this research note is: to present the available evidence about the medium- to long-term outcomes and impact of ECEC provision from global literature and detail on how these are measured, with a focus on education and labour market outcomes for children as well as labour market outcomes for parents whose children receive ECEC provision.

The purpose of this study was to examine the factor structure of the Family Involvement Questionnaire--Elementary Version with families in Belize. Participants were 185 primary caregivers of children in primary education settings in Belize. Caregivers were given the Family Involvement Questionnaire--Elementary Version to measure their educational involvement in their children's schooling. Findings indicated the factor structure of the Family Involvement Questionnaire--Elementary Version in Belize was not congruent with the factor structures with samples from the U.S. and New Zealand. Exploratory factor analysis suggested a five-factor solution: (a) home-school communication, (b) home expectations and monitoring, (c) educational support, (d) school and community involvement, and (e) school attendance. In light of similar measurement studies in the literature, these data indicate that family educational involvement varies across geographic and cultural contexts. This suggests that interventions and policies to improve education outcomes via family involvement ought to consider the unique structure of families' involvement in the educational system. [This is the online first version of an article published in "Assessment for Effective Intervention."]

The Expanded Food and Nutrition Education Program (EFNEP) is the nation's first nutrition education program and remains at the forefront of educational efforts to reduce nutrition insecurity of low-income families and youth today. Funded by the USDA's National Institute of Food and Agriculture (NIFA), EFNEP supports program participants' efforts toward self-sufficiency and nutritional health and well-being. EFNEP also combines hands-on learning, applied science, and program data to improve its effectiveness, efficiency, and accountability. Collectively, 76 land-grant institutions deliver EFNEP through Cooperative Extension. Other federal programs and public and private efforts have joined with EFNEP to improve this nation's nutritional health and well-being. EFNEP's uniqueness lies in its deep community roots, university connections, and in hiring and training peer educators to teach low-income families to develop healthier behaviors. Each year, EFNEP produces measurable evidence that shows how low-income families succeed when they have access to NIFA programs. Annual data consistently shows that more than 90 percent of adult EFNEP participants report improved behaviors following program involvement. This report provides statistical information on the following topics: (1) Reaching Low Income Families; (2) Reaching Diverse Populations; (3) Saving Money/Improving Diets; and (4) Changing Adult Behavior/Influencing Youth. [For the 2017 report, see ED594865.]

This Report Card offers an assessment of child well-being in the context of sustainable development across 41 countries of the European Union (EU) and the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD). Specifically, this report seeks to bring the SDG [Sustainable Development Goal] targets for children in high-income countries into meaningful operation (while staying true to the ambitions of the global agenda) and to establish a point of departure for reviewing the SDG framework in these contexts. It focuses on those goals and targets with most direct relevance to the well-being of children in high-income settings. Where appropriate, it adapts the agreed SDG indicator, the better to reflect the problems facing children in such countries. The results therefore highlight the new challenges set by the SDGs.

This, the 30th annual "National Child Count of Children and Youth Who Are Deaf-Blind," is the first and longest running registry and knowledge base of children who are deaf-blind in the world. Begun in 1986 on behalf of the U.S. Department of Education, it represents a nearly thirty year collaborative effort between the National Center on Deaf-Blindness (NCDB), its predecessors, and each state and multi-state deaf-blind project throughout the country, as well as those projects funded in the Pacific Trust territories, the Virgin Islands, and Puerto Rico. Initially requested by the U.S. Department of Education as an examination of the discrepancy between the National Deaf-Blind Child Count and the Office of Special Education Program's (OSEP) annual December 1 counts of children and students with disabilities being served under IDEA Part C or Part B, the child count has expanded over time to inform the work of a range of OSEP-funded deaf-blind projects during the ensuing years, including the current national, state, and multi-state technical assistance and dissemination projects. The National Deaf-Blind Child Count has been collaboratively designed, implemented, and revised to serve as the common vehicle to meet federal grant requirements for both the State and Multi-State Deaf-Blind Technical Assistance Projects and the National Deaf-Blind Technical Assistance Center, as well as serve as a common data collection and reporting mechanism for use across the country. [For the 2014 report see ED581437.]

The National Child Count of Children and Youth who are Deaf-Blind is the first and longest running registry and knowledge base of children who are deaf-blind in the world. Begun in 1986 on behalf of the U.S. Department of Education, it represents a nearly thirty year collaborative effort between the National Center on Deaf-Blindness (NCDB), its predecessors, and each State/Multi-State Deaf-Blind Project throughout the country, as well as those projects funded in the Pacific Trust territories, the Virgin Islands and Puerto Rico. Initially requested by the Department of Education as an examination of the discrepancy between the National Child Count of Children and Youth who are DeafBlind and OSEP's annual December 1 counts, the child count has continued based on the work scope of the deaf-blind program national center, technical assistance and dissemination centers, and state/multi-state projects that have been federally funded in ensuing years. It has been collaboratively designed, implemented and revised to serve as the common vehicle to meet federal grant requirements for both State/Multi-State and National DeafBlind Technical Assistance Projects, as well as serving as a common data collection and reporting mechanism for use across the country. Consistent with the priorities under which NCDB, its predecessors, and the state/multi-state deaf-blind projects are funded, this national child count is used to help identify national and state technical assistance needs for children and youth who are deaf-blind, their families and the service providers and systems which serve them. [For the 2013 report see ED548230.]

For young people to learn, grow, and thrive, they must first be safe. In fiscal year 2020, approximately 618,000 children in the United States experienced abuse and neglect, and 1,750 died as a result. The effects of child abuse, which can include failure in school, depression, substance use, or involvement in the justice system, can be mitigated if children receive timely, trauma-informed services. The Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention (OJJDP) supports the work and expansion of children's advocacy centers nationwide. In 2021 alone, the 939 centers served more than 386,000 children--treating victims and investigating and prosecuting cases of child abuse--and trained nearly 2.9 million people on how to prevent child abuse.

Hardly a week goes by in the United States (and to varying degrees, in the rest of the world) that the word "terrorism" does not appear in the collective consciousness, as represented, channeled, and shaped by the mass media in its many print, broadcast, and internet manifestations. While relatively few children worldwide (and even fewer children domestically in the United States) have been the specific targets for acts of terrorism, some have, and most are growing up in a world in which terrorism in its many aspects is a salient cultural phenomenon. This paper explores the impact of growing up in a world with terrorism on children and youth. It considers both the direct traumatic effects of being a victim and the indirect effects of living in communities and societies in which the threat of terrorism is on the minds of children, but perhaps more importantly, of adults generally, and parents and policy makers in particular. It also considers policy initiatives and programmatic responses. [This document includes two commentaries: (1) Towards a More Holistic Approach to Helping Children Affected by Terrorism and Political Violence (Kathleen Kostelny and Michael Wessells); and (2) Children and Political Violence: Progress on the Pathways of Risk, Resilience, and Peace (Ann S. Masten). Commentaries are individually referenced.]

As the data in this new edition of the Innocenti Report Card series show, in the past five years, rising numbers of children and their families have experienced difficulty in satisfying their most basic material and educational needs. Most importantly, the Great Recession is about to trap a generation of educated and capable youth in a limbo of unmet expectations and lasting vulnerability. League Tables, the flagship tool of the Innocenti Report Card series, rank the change, since the onset of the crisis, in the poverty levels of children and the impact of the recession on youth. The Report also explores the effects of the recession on youth seeking to enter or remain in the labour force in the middle of a recession. [Support for this report was provided by the Government of Italy.]

The strengths and abilities children develop from infancy through adolescence are crucial for their physical, emotional, and cognitive growth, which in turn help them to achieve success in school and to become responsible, economically self-sufficient, and healthy adults. Capable, responsible, and healthy adults are clearly the foundation of a well-functioning and prosperous society, yet America's future is not as secure as it could be because millions of American children live in families with incomes below the poverty line. A wealth of evidence suggests that a lack of adequate economic resources for families with children compromises these children's ability to grow and achieve adult success, hurting them and the broader society. "A Roadmap to Reducing Child Poverty" reviews the research on linkages between child poverty and child well-being, and analyzes the poverty-reducing effects of major assistance programs directed at children and families. This report also provides policy and program recommendations for reducing the number of children living in poverty in the United States by half within 10 years. [Numerous organizations sponsored this work and the full list can be seen in the document.]

Part 1 of the Report Card presents a league table of child well-being in 29 of the world's advanced economies. Part 2 looks at what children say about their own well-being (including a league table of children's life satisfaction). Part 3 examines changes in child well-being in advanced economies over the first decade of the 2000s, looking at each country's progress in educational achievement, teenage birth rates, childhood obesity levels, the prevalence of bullying, and the use of tobacco, alcohol and drugs.

This paper investigates the effect of multiple cultures and languages on the bilingual utterances of Libyan children who live in the United States and who have acquired English after they arrived there at ages from 3 to 5. Data analysis is based on the Markedness Model (Myers-Scotton, 1993) in order to determine which language is the unmarked code and which language is the marked one. According to Myers-Scotton, the unmarked code is mostly the native language, which is also supposed to be the dominant language. The bilingual utterances in this study are analyzed in terms of subjects' responses to the interviewer and the culture-specific topic under discussion; some of the responses are made in a code different from the one in which the question was asked; others are culture-related. The results show that it is the dominant language (not necessarily the native language) that is most likely the unmarked code, and the less dominant language is the marked code which is chosen more consciously. (Contains 5 tables and 2 figures.)

Findings from a survey of parents' ratings of seven different human-like qualities of four socially interactive robots are reported. The four robots were Popchilla, Keepon, Kaspar, and CosmoBot. The participants were 96 parents and other primary caregivers of young children with disabilities 1 to 12 years of age. Results showed that Popchilla, a highly engaging toy-like robot, was judged as more animate and likeable compared to the other three robots. Implications for intervening with young children with disabilities are described.

For the first time in twenty years the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS, 2009) is considering changes to federal regulations governing research. The Common Rule provides the basis for government regulations and Institutional Review Boards (IRB). Proposed changes will have a significant impact on Institutional Review Board evaluation of research involving infants, children and adolescents. For example, such a revision can serve to rectify or exacerbate often observed IRB inconsistencies and over-estimation of probable harms when applying "minimal risk" or "exempt" criteria to research involving minors. Proposed revisions may also affect the feasibility of research on adolescent risk that requires waiver of parental or guardian permission to be successfully implemented. Further, recommendations for a new category of "informational risk" based on current and emerging advances in analysis and storage of bio-specimens and information technologies for archival research will have significant influence on ethical procedures required for collection and storage of longitudinal and cross-sectional data. Given the importance of any rule change to the conduct of science related to children, the Society for Research in Child Development (SRCD) convened the SRCD Task Force on Proposed Changes to the Common Rule. The purpose of this report is to alert policymakers, scientists, and participant groups to proposed changes most relevant to research involving children and to provide recommendations for ensuring the responsible conduct of child and adolescent research in the final regulatory changes. (Contains 1 footnote.) [Commentaries by Kenneth D. Pimple and Noreen Yazejian & Barbara Davis Goldman are included. Commentaries are individually referenced.]

In recent years, a boom in immigration and high birth rates among the foreign-born population has led to significant growth in the number of children in the United States who speak a language other than English at home. This demographic change presents a challenge to the public school system, where English proficiency is central to a child's success. The vast majority of these children are legal citizens, yet as a nation, we have yet to determine how to meet this challenge. State education leaders in Illinois have first-hand experience with these challenges as the immigrant population in the state has grown in recent decades, and has spread to suburban and rural areas where many schools aren't yet accustomed to serving students who are not proficient in English. Illinois is one of the first states to try to tackle this problem as early as possible--before children enroll in kindergarten. While most state programs for ELL students begin when a child is enrolled in kindergarten or first grade, Illinois is in the process of extending its ELL program into state-funded pre-K programs. This will affect a sizeable portion of children in the state-funded Preschool for All program. Recent data shows that 34.2 percent of Preschool for All graduates in Chicago and 13.1 percent of Preschool for All graduates outside Chicago receive bilingual services when they moved on to kindergarten. The change will, the state hopes, create more continuity between pre-K and the early grades of school when students are developing crucial language skills, and reduce remediation for students in later grades by building important language skills early on. This paper takes a deep look at how the state came to see a need for these policies and how it is implementing them on a large scale. It also highlights two parts of Illinois's approach that merit consideration by other states with large or growing ELL populations. First, by expanding into pre-K, the state has created opportunities to align ELL programs across the early school years, opening the possibilities for districts to adopt a PreK-3rd approach. A glossary is included. (Contains 57 notes.)

The Annie E. Casey Foundation's 2012 KIDS COUNT[R] Data Book shows both promising progress and discouraging setbacks for the nation's children: While their academic achievement and health improved in most states, their economic well-being continued to decline. This year's Data Book uses an updated index of 16 indicators of child well-being, organized into four categories: Economic Well-Being, Health, Education, and Family and Community. The new methodology reflects the tremendous advances in child development research since the first KIDS COUNT Data Book in 1990. Appended are: (1) Child Well-Being Rankings; and (2) Data for 16 Indicators of Child Well-Being. (Contains 5 figures and 29 endnotes.) [For "KIDS COUNT Data Book, 2011: State Profiles of Child Well-Being. America's Children, America's Challenge: Promoting Opportunity for the Next Generation," see ED522925.]

Every 10 years, the U.S. Census Bureau counts every man, woman, and child to track the growth of our national, state, and local populations. Between 2000 and 2010, Texas' total population grew at twice the national rate to more than 25 million people. A large part of Texas' growth is due our child population, which grew by 16 percent to 6.9 million children. This report examines the newest census data and describes how Texas' child population changes are as varied as the state itself, differing depending on whether they live in urban or rural areas and their race/ethnicity. These changes are discussed in the context of our ongoing revenue struggle to find enough money to fund our basic needs now and plan for our future. (Contains 11 endnotes.)

Language immersion from birth is crucial to a child's language development. However, language immersion can be particularly challenging for hearing parents of deaf children to provide as they may have to overcome many difficulties while learning American Sign Language (ASL). We are in the process of creating a mobile application to help hearing parents learn ASL. To this end, we have interviewed members of our target population to gain understanding of their motivations and needs when learning sign language. We found that the most common motivation for parents learning ASL is better communication with their children. Parents are most interested in acquiring grammar knowledge through learning to read stories to their children. (Contains 1 figure and 2 tables.)

The most recent figures place the number of juvenile arrests in the United States at 2.11 million. (OJJDP, 2009). In some states, children as young as 10 years old are incarcerated for violent offenses. Crowded juvenile facilities are often unable to meet the needs of these large numbers of youth. The cost to treat offenders within long-term residential facilities is expensive. States spend anywhere from $4 million (in smaller states like Hawaii) to $450 million in larger states such as California on their annual juvenile corrections budget (freelibrary.com, 2010). Locked confinement in a state juvenile correction institution can run in excess of $60,000 annually (Tyler, Ziedenberg, and Lotke, 2006). As an alternative to incarceration for adjudicated youth, several forms of adventure therapy programming have been used. Most of these programs were developed around the premise that the structure of the adventure experience and associated facilitation could produce beneficial changes more effectively than time spent within a locked treatment facility. Just as the type of adventure therapy programs are mixed, so are the outcome research findings associated with juvenile delinquency. Several studies criticize adventure therapy with adjudicated youth for having insignificant or no lasting evidence of effectiveness, including Aos, Miller, and Drake (2006), Brown, Borduin, and Henggeler, (2001), Moote and Wodarski (1997), and Wilson and Lipsey (2000). As recognized in these studies, the key to unlocking the understanding of what is an effective adventure therapy program for juvenile delinquents is the inclusion of certain critical elements. Gass (1993), and more recently in Gillis and Gass (2010), identified seven key factors that seem to predominate the treatment elements of successful programs. These seven elements include treatment: (1) enhanced through action-oriented experiences, (2) centered on the use of unfamiliar client environments, (3) producing a climate of functional change through the positive use of stress, (4) highly informed with client assessment, (5) conducted in a small group, supportive atmosphere, (6) focused on solution oriented principles and techniques, and (7) that changed the role of therapist to remain more "mobile" to actively design and frame interventions.

More than 5.7 million children lived in extreme poverty in the United States in 2008--surviving on less than $7 or $8 per day. Almost 1 in every 12 children was in a household with an income below 50 percent of the federal poverty line. These children belonged to households in every state of the Union, but they were largely concentrated in the 15 states of the American South. More than 2.4 million extremely poor children--42 percent of the nation's total--lived in the South. This report raises serious questions about the impact and validity of current educational policies and practices at every level on children in extreme poverty. These children exist in significant numbers in school districts in every region and state in the country. But, no educational policy at any level today acknowledges America's large population of children in extreme poverty and the extraordinary challenges they face in education. In these hard times, policymakers and educators can help to assure that the children with the least do not suffer the most as students by adopting an informal practice of an "extreme child poverty impact assessment." This impact assessment should gauge how any major change in policy, practice, or funding in public education might adversely or positively affect the education of children in extreme poverty in their school districts and offer alternatives that could reduce any adverse impact. (Contains 3 footnotes.) [For the full report, "The Worst of Times: Children in Extreme Poverty in the South and Nation. SEF Research and Policy Report," see ED524090.]

People in the United States, though only five percent of the world's population, consume two-thirds of the world's illegal drugs. People in the United States, though only five percent of the world's population, incarcerate 25 percent of the world's prisoners. It is no coincidence that of the 2.3 million inmates in U.S. prisons, 65 percent--1.5 million--meet the DSM-IV (Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fourth Edition) medical criteria for alcohol or other drug abuse and addiction. Another 20 percent--458,000--even though they don't meet the DSM-IV medical criteria for alcohol and other drug abuse and addiction nevertheless were substance involved; i.e., were under the influence of alcohol or other drugs at the time of their offense, stole money to buy drugs, are substance abusers, violated the alcohol or drug laws, or share some combination of these characteristics. This report, uncovers these troubling facts and, even more disturbingly, finds that the situation has been getting worse since The National Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse (CASA) at Columbia University issued its first report on this subject, "Behind Bars", just over a decade ago. This new report constitutes the most exhaustive analysis ever undertaken to identify the extent to which alcohol and other drugs are implicated in the crimes and incarceration of America's prison population. This report, following more than a decade after CASA's initial analysis, finds that despite greater recognition of the problem and potential solutions, this country has allowed the population of substance-involved inmates crowding the prisons and jails--and the related costs and crimes--to increase. This report sets out steps the country can take to reduce crime and the taxpayer costs of prisons by addressing treatment needs of offenders while holding them accountable for their crimes. Appendices include: (1) Data Analysis Methodology; and (2) Proposed Guidelines for Providing Addiction Treatment in Prisons and Jails. (Contains 10 figures, 46 tables, and 456 notes.)

The numbers of poor and low income students in the public schools of the South and nation have substantially increased during the last decade. Today a majority of the South's public school students are low income, and nationwide more than 45 percent of the public school children are also eligible for free or reduced lunches due to low family income. A large, growing number of children live in destitute, often desperate conditions across the country--girls and boys under the age of 18 whose families and households have incomes below 50 percent of the national poverty threshold. These children include the homeless and a much larger number of children in transitory or fragile households where each person survives on less than seven or eight dollars a day. These children live in extreme poverty in the United States. This report examines the latest census data on children in extreme poverty in the South and the nation. It summarizes and analyzes patterns of extreme child poverty in the states and in most US counties. It also estimates how the recent recession has expanded the number of children in extreme poverty in both the South and the nation. The report uses data for all children--not just school-age children. It examines patterns and conditions in more than 2,700 public school districts with almost 32 million students enrolled across the United States. Finally, the report addresses some of the implications of these findings for local, state, and federal policies in education, and it offers specific conclusions and recommendations. Appended are: (1) Percentage of Children in Extreme Poverty by State; (2) Nation's 100 School Districts with Highest Reported Rates of Extreme Child Poverty; (3) Nation's School Districts Reporting No Extreme Child Poverty; (4) Estimated Increase of Children in Extreme Poverty by State; (5) State Indicators of Recent Economic Hardship; and (6) Notes on Data, Estimates, and Methods. A bibliography is included. (Contains 11 footnotes.) [For "The Worst of Times: Children in Extreme Poverty in the South and Nation. Special Summary," see ED524095.]