Research and data on youth and delinquency is critical for identifying opportunities and developing strategies to support positive development through prevention and intervention. Responses to youth misbehavior by youth-serving systems — including education, child welfare, behavioral health, and justice systems — can play an important role in promoting or disrupting youths’ healthy social and emotional development. The five findings below provide insights into the nature, scope, and context of youth and delinquency. First, youth risk-taking is part of the normative developmental process — with brain maturation continuing into early adulthood. Second, engagement in offending tends to increase through adolescence and then decline. Third, only a small percentage of youths are arrested for any crime — even fewer for violent crime. Fourth, youth arrests for violent offenses have declined from a historic peak in the mid-1990s. Fifth, the youth contribution to violent crime arrests is less than that from other age groups, including young adults.

The Jefferson County Equitable Fines and Fees (JEFF) Project—a research–practice partnership among MDRC, the Alabama Appleseed Center for Law and Justice, the University of Alabama at Birmingham, and the Tenth Judicial Circuit Court of Alabama—uses five years of longitudinal, case-level data and qualitative research to explore how Alabama’s court fines and fees system plays out in Jefferson County, Alabama. This brief presents early results from analysis of the quantitative data collected. The preliminary findings highlight inequities in how legal financial obligations are assessed and distributed and the inefficacy of LFOs as a revenue source. Analyses showed that indigent individuals across all charges were assessed higher financial penalties and paid less toward their debt than those who could afford private representation. In addition, across groups, most people did not satisfy their balances over the five-year period, and many incurred a restitution recovery fee due to missed payments. Furthermore, the research depicts a system in which restitution often goes unpaid because of the state’s priority disbursement schedule, which compensates law enforcement agencies that collect debt before funding victim restitution.

The issue of cell phone use in schools is wide-reaching and touches on topics from privacy to acceptable use. A preliminary scan of state policy, state education agency resources, and local education agency policies, finds that the issue of cell phone use in schools is most often dealt with at the local level. When addressed at the state level, the policy generally 1) broadly defines what constitutes a misuse of a cell phone, 2) directs local agencies to adopt acceptable use policies and 3) prohibits the use of cell phones during state-administered testing. The report notes that in Florida, House Bill 379, enacted in 2023, prohibits students from using cell phones during instructional time and requires teachers to designate an area for cell phones during instructional time. In February 2024, the Alabama State Board of Education passed a resolution strongly encouraging local boards to adopt a policy limiting cell phone use while on school property. In Kentucky, state statute requires the board of education of each school district to develop a policy regarding the possession and use of cell phones by students while on school property or while attending a school-sponsored event. The policy is to be included in the district’s standards of student conduct.

The White House National Strategy on Hunger, Nutrition, and Health was released in the fall of 2022 with the goal to end hunger in America with one strategy to advance a pathway to free school meals for all, referred to as universal free school meals (UFSMs). Since 2014, there has been a provision, to allow for federal reimbursement for qualifying schools to serve free meals to all students. Qualification is based on the percentage of the student body that qualifies for free meals; these students come from households with an overall income of less than 130% of the federal poverty line or for reduced-price price meals if they come from households with an overall income between 130% and 185% of the federal poverty level. In the 2022 to 2023 school year, 82% of eligible schools had implemented CEP, providing 19.9 million children access to UFSMs. In the 2023-24 school year, 9 states (California, Colorado, Maine, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, New Mexico, Nevada, and Vermont) went one step further by offering UFSMs to all schools regardless of eligibility. There is debate in the United States on the expansion of UFSMs for all students regardless of income because of the additional spending that would be required. Prior to allocating federal funds, research should be reviewed to assess the effectiveness of UFSMs. This systematic review 6 studies comprising 11,000 elementary, middle, and high schools. It found that UFSMs were associated with increased meal participation, no or slight improvements in attendance, and decreased obesity prevalence and suspension rates; certainty of evidence was moderate for lunch participation and low or very low for other outcomes. Studies did not report several important outcomes, such as diet quality and food security, suggesting the need for more high-quality research encompassing policy-relevant indicators.

Quality Rated is the state of Georgia’s quality rating and improvement system—a systemic approach to assessing, improving, and communicating the quality of child care and early education programs under the Georgia Department of Early Care and Learning (DECAL). Quality Rated is designed to promote high-quality experiences that support the physical, social, emotional, and academic development of children in home- and center-based non-parental care. This snapshot features insights from (1) the 1,254 home- and center-based child care leaders participating in Quality Rated (QRP) who responded to the research team’s survey in early 2023 answering questions about the ways they support child health and well-being that are not currently counted by Quality Rated and (2) the 65 home- and center-based child care leaders (a mix of those participating and not participating in Quality Rated) and advocates that shared their perspectives on the survey findings. Key survey findings include 89% of survey respondents reported supporting children’s nutritional needs by providing hot meals and other nutritional foods such as fruits and vegetables, and 22% of survey respondents reported having inclusive playgrounds to accommodate children with developmental delays and disabilities. Furthermore, center-based QRPs (43%) are more likely to screen children for developmental delays and disabilities to identify their needs than home-based QRPs (33%). Lastly, some providers expressed challenges in supporting children's health and well-being in the current system. For example, providers reported that referrals for early intervention upon screening a child for developmental delays or disabilities were often unfulfilled or resulted in long wait times. In addition, providers also expressed encountering children with more complex behavior issues since the pandemic, and a need for more mental health support to stabilize children with disabilities.

As of June 30, 2024, 236 nonprofit, for-profit, and other entities that met the Florida Single Audit Act (FSAA) t threshold requirements had filed financial reporting packages with the Florida Auditor General for fiscal years ended October 1, 2022, through September 30, 2023. The research team’s examination of the financial reporting package delivery and filing dates and the status of the respective audit firms’ licenses found that most of the financial reporting packages were timely filed by properly licensed audit firms. In addition, pursuant to state law, the research team reviewed a sample of 60 of the 236 financial reporting packages to determine compliance with applicable reporting requirements and found that the information provided was generally presented in accordance with generally accepted accounting principles, generally accepted government auditing standards (GAGAS), the FSAA, Department of Financial Services (DFS) rules, and Auditor General rules. However, the department noted the following key findings. Contrary to state law, 8 of the 236 financial reporting packages were filed with us 6 to 226 days after the 9-month deadline, and 1 of those packages plus 13 other financial reporting packages were filed with us 50 to 180 days after delivery of the financial reporting package to the auditee. Also, the 60 sampled financial reporting packages did not always comply with applicable requirements in the FSAA, DFS rules, and Auditor General rules. Finally, audits of four entities were performed by four different audit firms that did not hold active or temporary Florida certified public accountant license as of the date of the auditors’ reports on the financial statements.

The U.S. Census Bureau’s Census Business Builder (CBB) is a resource that can help identify vulnerable communities and economic sectors that would benefit from the allocation of emergency funds in the event of a disaster. The CBB provides the economic and demographic details of any area impacted by a disaster, including potential disruption to supply chains in affected areas — a valuable tool during hurricane season. Users can add one or more industries to determine the impact to specific economic sectors. They can also customize the map, add and remove map variables, apply filters and compare one county to another within the dashboard. The CBB shows that the total population for the state of Florida is 21.6 million with 5.1% of the population under age 5. The median household income is shown as $68,000 and 89% of the working age population has attained at least a high school diploma.

Residential care communities provide housing for people who cannot live independently but generally do not require the skilled care provided by nursing homes. In 2022, on a given day, about 1,016,400 residents lived in residential care communities. With the aging of the U.S. population, the number of residential care community residents will likely increase, becoming a substantial segment of the long-term care population. This report presents national estimates of selected characteristics of residential care community residents in 2022. Key findings from the report include that in 2022, most residential care community residents were female (67%), White non-Hispanic (92%), and age 85 and older (53%). About 17% of residential care community residents were Medicaid beneficiaries, and the percentage of residents with Medicaid varied by age. Among residential care community residents, 75% needed assistance with bathing, 71% needed assistance with walking, and 62% needed assistance with three or more activities of daily living. Among residential care community residents, about three in five had a diagnosis of high blood pressure and about two in five had a diagnosis of Alzheimer disease or other dementias.

Cerebrovascular disease (stroke) is a leading cause of long-term disability and premature death in people ages 45–64. There have been persistent disparities in stroke death rates by region of the country as well as by race and Hispanic origin. Key findings include that after a period of decline between 2002 and 2012, the stroke death rate for adults ages 45–64 increased 7% between 2012 (20.2 per 100,000) and 2019 (21.7) and an additional 12% through 2021 (24.4). For men, stroke death rates increased in each region from 2012 to 2020, and then rates declined or did not change significantly through 2022. For women, stroke death rates increased for all regions from 2012 to 2020 and continued to increase through 2022 in the Northeast. Black non-Hispanic (subsequently, Black) men had the highest stroke death rates among men in each region, with the highest rate in the South (65.7). Black women had the highest stroke death rates in each region, with rates higher in the Midwest (41.0), South (41.6), and West (45.0) compared with the Northeast (26.9).