South Carolina Kids Count
Many of the serious difficulties of adolescence have deep roots in problems emerging during the pre-school years of life and during unsuccessful academic careers in kindergarten through grade five. These problems are described through data in the Kids Count report in terms of family, economic status, health, readiness, and early school performance. This data presents an alarming picture of children's life circumstances and development during the early years.
| Year | Total | White | African American & Other | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Low birthweight babies | 2001 | 8.3% | 6.9% | 13.2% |
| Births to teen mothers under 18 | 2001 | 3.5% | 2.5% | 6.6% |
| Births to teen mothers under 20 | 2001 | 10.5% | 8.9% | 15.6% |
| Births to mothers not completing high school | 2001 | 19.9% | 18.2% | 25.3% |
| Births to single mothers* | 2001 | 30.3% | 21.5% | 59.9% |
| Children 0-5 in single parent families | 2000 | 22.8% | 13.0% | 51.2% |
| Children 6-17 in single parent families | 2000 | 27.5% | 18.4% | 53% |
| Females in the labor force with kids under 6 | 2000 | 61.7% | 58.1% | 72.5% |
| Females in the labor force with kids 6-17 | 2000 | 70.7% | 69.7% | 73.3% |
| Poverty among kids ages 0-5 | 2000 | 14.9% | 8.9% | 31.1% |
| Poverty among kids 6-17 | 2000 | 12.5% | 7.5% | 25.0% |
| First grade "not ready" | 2001 | 12% | 7.3% | 20.4% |
| Failures grades 1-3 | 2000 | 15% | 11.5% | 22.4% |
| Special Education placement, ages 8-9 | 2002 | 18.5% | 18.3% | 18.8% |
| PACT below basic in reading grade 3 | 2002 | 20.4% | 13.4% | 34.9% |
| PACT below basic in math grade 3 | 2002 | 25.1% | 16.6% | 42.6% |
* Data include paternity acknowledgements.
Statewide trends: Single parent families have increased. More and more parents of young children are working. Education of parents has improved. Infant mortality is down, but low birthweight has not improved. Poverty declined dramatically in the 1970s but has not changed much for young children since then, especially for the growing numbers of children in families headed by single mothers. School readiness has recently improved for the first time since the early 1980s, as assessed by teachers of 1st grade students. Large percentages of students are still placed in special education, even though many of them are recognized as disabled only in academic learning but not in other areas of life. School failures and students over-age for grade 3 have declined, as indicated by the following data for Greenville County:
| 1991 | 1992 | 1992 | 1994 | 1995 | 1996 | 1997 | 1998 | 1999 | 2000 | 2001 | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1st graders not "ready" | 26.6% | N/A% | 26.7% | 26.7% | 27.2% | 23.3% | 20.1% | 19.4% | 15.4% | 13.6% | 12% |
| Failures grades 1-3 | NA | 19.8% | 15.9% | 13.2% | 11.2% | 13.1% | 14.1% | 12.4% | 13.4% | 15% | NA |
| Over-age for grade 3 | NA | 29.9% | 26.7% | 24.5% | 21.3% | 20.2% | 20% | 18.5% | 22.5% | 16.7% | 19.2% |
With so many of today's teens not having enjoyed success by ages six to eight through the support of their families, communities and schools, they are vulnerable to the negative social pressures of contemporary media influences and youth culture. The consequences are reflected in the following table summarizing data from the School Achievement and Adolescent Risk sections of the Kids Count report.
While many students are making solid progress in school, too many others are performing below minimum standards of the basic academic skills. Approximately 40% of 4th graders in South Carolina perform below the basic level on the National Assessment of Education Progress in math and 45% in reading, as compared with 23.6% of 4th graders below basic in math and 19.8% in reading on the PACT test in the county. Statewide, in the 8th grade, 45% perform below the basic level on the NAEP in math as compared with 38.3% in the county on the PACT test, and 35% statewide below basic on NAEP in reading as compared with 28.2% in the county on PACT. Compared with national standards, the percentage of low performing students reported by Kids Count may underestimate the numbers of students not achieving national minimum competency standards in the basic skills of reading, writing, and math.
The Kids Count report presents data trends over 15 years, including grade 8 BSAP and first time administration of national norm-referenced tests in grades 4 and 9 during 1983, 1990, and 1995. Statewide these results did not show positive trends during the 1990s; however, positive trends have been achieved since 1999 on PACT. Most of the poor performers eventually are part of the one third of students who later fail parts of the high school Exit Exam and are among the quarter to third of youth in South Carolina who do not graduate. By ages 25 - 34, one sixth have still never graduated or passed the GED.
| Total | White Males | White Females | African American & Other Males | African American & Other Females | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| PACT grade 5 below basic (Math) | 28% | 18.2% | 18.3% | 50.9% | 45.3% |
| PACT grade 5 below basic (Reading) | 22% | 16.1% | 10.8% | 47.2% | 31.3% |
| PACT grade 8 below basic (Math) | 38.3% | 30.9% | 27.4% | 62.5% | 55% |
| PACT grade 8 below basic (Reading) | 28.2% | 23.8% | 14.3% | 57.7% | 39.1% |
| Exit Exam (failing one or more parts in 10th grade) | 30.8% | 21.4% | 20.6% | 55.8% | 54.8% |
| Dropouts by grade 12* | 26.4% | 28.9% | 20.7% | 37.0% | 22.0% |
| Pregnancy ages 14-17 | 2.4% | N/A | 1.9% | NA | 4.3% |
| Alcohol use in past 30 days by students grades 7-12 | 40.1% | 41.4% | 42.5% | 29.4% | 33.8% |
| Drug use in past 30 days by students grades 7-12 | 21.9% | 25.8 % | 19.2 % | 23.9 % | 15.4 % |
| Juvenile delinquency ages 15 - 17 | 6.0% | 6.2% | 3.1% | 12.5% | 6.7% |
* This is calculated using 12th grade enrollment data. Graduation data are not available by gender and race.
Risk-taking behaviors: Too many adolescents assert independence by rejecting adults and adopting or experimenting with the youth culture promoting excessive risk-taking. The 2001 DAODAS survey showed that of county high schoolers in the last year: 47.0% would be unlikely to tell an adult if they heard a student threaten to harm someone and 65.2% unlikely to tell if they saw a student with drugs at school; 12.4% had carried a gun or knife for self-defense, 19.2% had been in a fight, 8.7% had received in-school suspension, 17.1% felt hopeless for two weeks or more, 8.2% seriously considered suicide, and 12.2% had stolen something worth more than $5.
Pregnancy rates of 14-17 year olds in the county have decreased from their post-1980 peak of 5.8%, falling to 2.4% in 2001. During the peak year approximately 17.4% of girls had become pregnant by age 18, but in 2001 approximately 7.2% had become pregnant by age 18, with roughly one-third becoming pregnant twice. This should come as no surprise since the 2001 Youth Risk Behavior Survey (YRBS) for South Carolina found that 38% of all females and 49% of males had engaged in sexual intercourse by age 15; that over 50% of males and 48% of females in the 11th and 12th grades had intercourse during any three month period; and that 27% of girls and 33% of boys in the 12th grade had intercourse with four or more persons during their young lives.
Alcohol and drug abuse is widespread among teens, especially middle class or wealthy children with ample spending money and available automobiles to "cruise around" without parental supervision. The DAODAS survey in 2001 showed that in a typical month 40.1% of high school students in county consume alcohol, and 22.4% binge drink 5 or more drinks. Drug use among high school students statewide increased significantly during the 1990s, with monthly marijuana use almost doubling from 12.5% in 1993 to 23.9% in 2001, according to the YRBS. The 2001 DAODAS survey indicated that 21.9% of county high school students used illegal drugs during the past month.
Delinquency is a serious problem among teens, typically starting in middle school and becoming increasingly prevalent in high school and the young adult years. In South Carolina, over 10% of all youth and nearly 20% of males are referred to the Family Courts for delinquency by age 18. Unfortunately, the data on arrested and adjudicated youth substantially underestimates the prevalence of teens who engage in crime at some time in their youth: roughly 20% - 30% overall and 35% - 55% for males. Approximately two-fifths of the referrals to the Solicitor for delinquency are elementary and middle grades students ages 14 and under. Over one quarter of delinquents come from families with incomes below $10,000. Less than one fifth come from families comprised of both natural parents. Moreover, over two-fifths have a family member with a criminal or delinquent record. Regrettably, rates of delinquency among youth 15-17 have increased substantially in Greenville County over the past 20 years:
| Total | White Males | White Females | African American & Other Males | African American & Other Females | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1982 | 2.3% | 2.6% | 1% | 6.3% | 2.1% |
| 1990 | 4.8% | 5.4% | 1.8% | 13.6% | 4.3% |
| 2002 | 6.0% | 6.2% | 3.1% | 12.5% | 6.7% |