Looking Back to Move Forward: Addressing Racial Inequities in Services for Young Children
According to the ancient Ghanaian legend of the Sankofa bird, before we can make progress we must “go back to the past and bring forward that which is useful.”
Looking at our nation’s past, many deep and stubborn racial disparities are evident. Ethnic and racial minorities are overrepresented among those living in poverty, in the criminal justice system, among individuals with limited occupational opportunities, and among those with poorer access to healthcare. What does this mean for the future of our youngest children moving forward?
Early childhood provides a window of opportunity for enriching growth and reducing vulnerability to social stressors — including poverty — so that our children can know who they are to become.
Nationally, children from birth to age 5 are more diverse with respect to race/ethnicity, country of origin, language and family type than any other age group. Young children also have the highest poverty rate in recent history. Each year, hundreds of thousands are born into poverty, and these children face disadvantage that threatens their growth, development and overall well-being.
Research has shown that effective programs supporting young children and their families — including home visiting, Early Head Start, quality child care, and Early Intervention — along with safe and affordable housing, access to healthcare, and paid family sick leave — can help children thrive and parents be successful. But in order for every child to succeed in life, we must expand access to quality services that can ensure a just start.
We know that investing in children works.
Researchers and advocates have shown that high-quality birth-to-three programs for low-income children lead to better educational attainment, employment, and positive health behaviors and outcomes through adulthood. Public investments in high-quality programs for disadvantaged children from birth to age five result in an estimated 13% annual rate of return.
And yet racial inequities prevent some families from getting the help that they need.
Families of color do not have equal access to early childhood programs and services. Effective programs serve only a fraction of the children in need. Specifically in Illinois, children of color are less likely to receive early intervention and home visiting services than white children. These racial disparities in program access must be understood and addressed so that we do not repeat and perpetuate inequities by denying some children services that promote optimal, healthy development.
We need to target services to those most in need.
To ensure an equitable start for all young children, we must understand which communities are most in need and who is actually being served. Complete, accurate data on racial and ethnic participation in early childhood programs must be collected, and those data sets must be tied to the quality of the programs. By mapping access across all early childhood programs, we can identify gaps in access to services, find new opportunities to close those gaps, and avoid advancing policies that unintentionally make the problem worse. Moreover, a robust longitudinal data system can help measure the effectiveness of multiple supports for families as children grow. These measures can help further continuous improvement in program quality, targeting, and outcomes.
Let’s better understand racial inequities, and make smart investments to ensure a healthy future for our children.
As the Sankofa bird teaches us, we must go back and reclaim our past so we can move forward. By understanding and acknowledging past inequities, we can make effective investments moving forward so that future generations grow up well educated, physically and emotionally healthy, and equipped to build a better society.
