This is so sad, though Save the Children's annual Mother's Day Report Card isn't telling us anything we don't already know.
Basically that it is very difficult to be a mother in the United States, which ranks 27th among the 158 countries surveyed. Niger -- where James, Jennifer, and their three children lived for a year -- ranks dead last.
The United States is among the richest countries in the world, and the most powerful. Yet we have arcane policies about motherhood, fatherhood, and early childhood.
The highest scoring countries (Ireland, Denmark, France, and Norway are among them) have child-friendly policies, good health for mothers and children, and high economic and educational status for mums.
Sweden ranks first.
In the United States, an alarming number of children are at great risk of failure in school because they are not getting the care and support they need in their early years. New Mexico, Nevada, Mississippi, Arizona and Alabama are the bottom five states where young children face the greatest obstacles to success in school. These states scored low on indicators of parental involvement, quality of home life and preschool participation. Parents in these states are clearly struggling to give their young children a good start in life – and as a result 71 to 81 percent of fourth graders in the public schools in these states are not reading at grade level. Connecticut, New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Vermont and Maine are the top five states where, generally speaking, parents and communities are doing a better job of preparing children to succeed in school. (p.5)You can access the PDF of the executive summary of the report here.
5 comments:
Michelle Obama was just talking about how hard it is to be a mother in the workforce yesterday. Huge improvements are needed.
I don't understand why "pro-family" values don't translate into support and aid for parents and children. We can do so much better than this -- but, somehow, choose not to.
Oh , wow nearly a yearly i have not been on this blog , last time i did it was to read about Niger
and now Niger is back on it
www.niger1.co
I think that a kid's success in school is very dependent upon a parents ability to offer the kind of support he or she needs. However, I don't think it's the school's responsibility to try to fix the problem. These parents need to be getting the support they need to be with their family and be the best parents they can be. School is - IMHO - secondary, but it seems to be wrapped up in this study.
I looked up the crime rates for those states. The bottom five you listed are among the highest crime ridden states, and the top five are among the lowest in crime. Very telling.
http://www.census.gov/statab/ranks/rank21.html
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