Roadmap of Need (2019)
This county-level report for child needs assessment ranks NC counties using various wellness indicators over four domains: health, youth behavior and safety, education, and economic development. This report can be used to see an overview of child-focused indicators of wellbeing, compare across counties, and advocate for resources or change.
Wellness indicators around social determinants of health include:
- Teen pregnancy
- Physician prevalence
- Child fatality
- Child food insecurity
- Child obesity
- Juvenile delinquency
- Short-term suspensions
- Juvenile detention admissions
- Children in DSS custody
- Child abuse and neglect
- Graduation rate
- 3rd grade reading proficiency
- NC math proficiency
- ACT composite scores
- Growth rating
- Median household income
- Child poverty
- Unemployment rate
- Education prevalence
- Single parent household data.
The comprehensive rankings used are based on averages of indicators, all categorized as having equal weight, and lacks the context on the equal weighting of the contributing indicators. They would be helpful in monitoring change of specific indicators, and in illustrating need and points of county-level comparison across the state in grant writing or policy advocacy.
These data are available on a county-level and sourced from an array of locations, including but not limited to the NC State Center for Health Statistics, Feeding America, North Carolina Department of Health and Human Services, the NC Department of Public Safety, and the NC Department of Public Instruction.