How much child care workers are paid and their experiences within the subsidy system impact their willingness and ability to serve low-income families, according to the nonpartisan Urban Institute in this February 2003 article.

For a significant number of children, bad oral health is a painful and chronic reality. This November 2002 National Governors Association brief describes what states can do to ensure these children have regular access to competent care and prevention.

This Ounce of Prevention Foundation brochure summarizes what we know about the early emotional development of young children, what places them at risk, what signs to look for, and how policymakers can support early childhood mental health strategies that respond to the needs of children under five and their families.

This report funded by the Packard Foundation offers concrete suggestions, from educating parents about safely storing guns to training health providers on the signs of substance abuse among parents and advocating for a refundable pre-tax child credit.

According to this Education Week report, low-income students will be at greater risk than their affluent counterparts because they tend to start school with fewer academic skills, their parents are less able to help with homework and their schools tend to have fewer resources.

This bilingual initiative serves Hispanic girls ages 9-14, their mothers and other caregivers. A public education initiative, it is designed to help them build and enhance their own self-esteem, mental health, decision-making and assertiveness skills, and to prevent the harmful consequences of alcohol, tobacco and illicit drugs.

The Build Initiative is a multi-state partnership that supports efforts to make sure that children from birth through age five are safe, healthy, eager to learn and ready to succeed in school.

The South has a larger concentration of working poor families, parents with little education and more children without health insurance than in any other region. An August 2002 Children's Defense Fund report urges Congress to add $11.25 billion in child care funding, pass an improved Temporary Assistance for Needy Families bill to help families raise their incomes through work, and maintain Children's Health Insurance Program funding for states to avoid cutbacks in programs targeting families as state revenues shrink.

Child care subsidies are one of the main supports offered to low-income parents under welfare reform. But two recent reports reveal that effort involved in remaining eligible for the subsidy can endanger parents' ability to hold down a job. Here's a summary from the Urban Institute's Assessing the New Federalism project.

Should every school district offer pre-kindergarten? What should it look like? We've summarized what members of the Connect for Kids community had to say about it in our week-long e-mail discussion.