This report examines the feasibility of using model-based techniques to estimate state-level crime victimization rates. The model uses two sources of input data: response variables and covariates. The model incorporates multiple crime types, including violent crimes, such as sexual assault and robbery, and property crimes, such as burglary and theft, and data for two aggregate time periods of 2017–2019 and 2020–2022. Researchers found that the state-level estimates vary considerably around the U.S. estimate for both violent crime and property crime. Specifically, estimates of violent crime rates for 2017–2019 ranged from 8.5 violent crimes per 1,000 persons in New Jersey to 58.4 crimes per 1,000 persons in Wyoming. The overall national estimate of the violent crime rate during 2017–2019 is 21.6 crimes per 1,000 persons. Eleven states, including Florida, are significantly below the U.S. estimate. Significant declines in the property crime rate at the state level are observed between the 2017–2019 and 2020–2022 aggregate time frames. Coefficients of variation for the state-level estimates are generally in the range of 10% to 30%. In addition, 20 states, including Florida, had property crime rates significantly below the U.S. estimate.

Youth homelessness can both result from and contribute to involvement in the juvenile justice system. Youth involved in the system are particularly vulnerable to housing insecurity upon their release. Meanwhile, youth experiencing homelessness are highly likely to be criminalized due to laws governing public space, such as juvenile curfews or anti-sleeping ordinances. This brief outline model programs and federal funding streams that address this unique crossover between youth homelessness and justice system involvement. For example, the Housing Stability for Youth in Courts is a state-wide partnership between juvenile justice courts and local service providers across six counties in Washington, designed to be a preventative tool for youth homelessness by identifying youth at risk within the juvenile court system and referring them and their families to prevention, intervention, and housing services and resources. There are several federal funding opportunities for entities to implement or maintain initiatives to support youth at risk or involved in the juvenile justice system and experiencing homelessness. For example, the U.S. Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention’s Building Local Continuums of Care to Support Youth Success grant supports jurisdictions' implementation of a community-based continuum of care for youth at risk of becoming or already involved in the juvenile justice system. In addition, the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development awards its Youth Homelessness Systems Improvement grants to support the development of infrastructure to address youth homelessness. The goal of this grant is also to make and improve connections, coordination, and information sharing within and between systems that serve at-risk youth.

In 2023, Mississippi had the highest incarceration rate in the nation, with 652 per 100,000 people incarcerated. However, there is no single resource that compiles, analyzes, and systematically presents this information, enabling stakeholders and policy leaders to make informed decisions about the state’s system. The Public Welfare Foundation, a private, nonprofit grantmaking organization, commissioned the Crime and Justice Institute to conduct an analysis of available data and compile a report to provide a clearer, more connected view of the state's adult criminal justice system. Key findings include that Mississippi’s incarceration rate is driven by nonviolent prison admissions; people are staying longer in prison largely due to longer sentences and low parole grant rates; recidivism is increasing, driven primarily by growing admissions for parole violations; and unmet mental health and substance use needs are contributing to unnecessary criminal justice system involvement.

The U.S. Department of Education administers the Full-Service Community Schools (FSCS) grant program. Grantees, typically school districts, community-based organizations, or universities, aim to transform local schools into community schools—hubs that coordinate and integrate a wide range of services and supports to meet the unique needs of children, their families, and surrounding communities. Grantees work with partner schools to implement the FSCS program. This snapshot examines whether the FSCS grant program helped expand the community school approach to schools that are consistent with program priorities: schools that are high poverty, located in rural areas, and new to or not yet fully implementing their community school approach. Analysis of recent data from the grant program and surveys of Fiscal Year 2023 grantees and their partner schools suggests that nearly all partner schools are high poverty; 98% compared with 60% of all public schools nationwide. In addition, almost half are located in rural areas; 48% percent, compared with 38% of all public schools nationwide. In addition, grantees predominantly served partner schools that were not yet fully implementing the community school approach and school districts that were new to the grant program. A majority of partner schools did not identify as a community school before receiving the grant. Fifty-seven percent of partner schools did not identify as a community school before they received the grant, with 83% of grantees partnering with at least one such school. Of the 42% of partner schools that reported identifying as a community school before the grant, most (62%) reported identifying as a community school for more than three years.

This study examines how performance changes when teachers transfer across very different school contexts. The Talent Transfer Initiative, a federal program, created a rare natural experiment to study such transfers by randomly assigning low-achieving schools the ability to offer high-performing teachers at higher-achieving schools a $20,000 transfer stipend. Forecast tests show that these high-performing teachers’ prior value added is only moderately predictive of their effectiveness in low-achieving schools. Using a difference-in-differences framework, researchers estimate that incentivized-transfer teachers’ value added dropped by 0.12 student standard deviations. This decline appears to be driven by lower match quality, negative indirect school effects, and the loss of student-specific human capital.

Academic pressure could increase the risk of adolescent depression and self-harm. However, there are few longitudinal studies of this association, and those that exist have limitations. The research team aimed to investigate associations between perceived levels of academic pressure and subsequent depressive symptoms and self-harm from adolescence to early adulthood. The research team’s hypothesis was that higher levels of academic pressure would be associated with higher levels of depressive symptoms and self-harm. The research team included 4,714 adolescents (2,725 [57.8%] female, 1989 [42.2%] male). In fully adjusted models, a 1-point increase in academic pressure at age 15 years was associated with a 0.43 point increase in depressive symptoms. This association was largest when depressive symptoms were assessed at age 16 years, but remained at age 22 years. For self-harm, in fully adjusted models, each 1-point increase in academic pressure was associated with 8% higher odds of self-harm, with no differences over time. The research team’s findings support the hypothesis that academic pressure is a potential modifiable risk factor for adolescent depressive symptoms, and possibly self-harm. Interventions to reduce academic pressure could be developed and evaluated.

A substantial number of programs designed to assist veterans are planned, funded, or implemented within states or similar geographic regions. At the same time, national programs operated by the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs or by national veteran-serving nonprofits may distribute resources to states or regional veterans integrated service networks. This report presents state-specific profiles that show how veterans’ needs vary substantially across states and how these differences should be considered when funding, designing, or implementing services and benefits designed to improve the lives of veterans. In Florida, there are a total of 1.3 million veterans in the state. In addition, about 50% of veterans in Florida are over the age of 65 years old. Florida ranks 26th in the nation for suicide rates (35.8 per 100,000) among veterans. Florida is also ranked 5th (12.5% compared to the national average of 14.7%) among the top ten states with binge drinking veterans. The veteran unemployment rate in Florida (3.3%) is lower than the national average at 3.7%.

Workplace benefits shape employees’ financial security and influence recruitment, productivity, and retention for employers. Yet access remains uneven. Small businesses, facing thinner margins, limited administrative capacity, and volatile revenue, often struggle to match the breadth of benefits that larger firms can provide through economies of scale. This brief examines the differences in employer-provided benefits between micro and small businesses (≤50 full-time equivalent employees) and medium and large businesses (≥100 full-time equivalent employees). Researchers found that 55% of employees at micro and small businesses have access to medical care benefits compared to 88% of employees at medium and large businesses. In addition, while 59% of employees at medium and large businesses have access to dental insurance, 27% of micro and small businesses offer dental insurance to its employees. Researchers also offer policy and practice recommendations to businesses to help them extend benefits to their employees, including incentivizing benefits adoption through financing tools and preferred lending terms for firms that expand benefits, expanding advisory services and toolkits to reduce administrative barriers for small employers, and scaling pooled purchasing and portable benefit models to lower costs and administrative burdens.

Over the past several decades, rising rates of substance misuse, substance use disorders, and related harms, including nonfatal and fatal overdoses, have placed a significant burden on individuals, communities, and the health care system. This report examines current approaches to integrating substance use disorder prevention with physical health care at the state level and identifies integration opportunities that serve adolescents aged 12–18. The most common integration activities included delivering substance use disorder prevention education and training to physical health care providers. Some examples of these activities include educating pharmacists on the importance of locking up prescription opioid medications, providing tobacco/vaping prevention education in medical schools and for health care providers, and placing naloxone vending machines at rural health clinics and doctors’ offices. Pediatric primary care and school-based health centers are the most common physical health care settings where substance use disorder prevention interventions occur, though implementation remains in early stages in many places.

Transition services available before and after exit can support and sustain a foster youth's success as they age out of care. New federal data confirm that extended foster care after age 18 improves young people’s outcomes. For example, foster care data from federal sources show that 69% of 19-year-olds in extended foster care were more likely to have a high school diploma or GED than those who were not in extended foster care. In addition, 19-year-olds in extended foster care were 65% less likely to be young parents, 64% less likely to be recently incarcerated, and 64% less likely to be disconnected from school or work when compared to 19-year-olds who had exited care for permanency at age 17 or 18. Data also shows that 19-year-olds in extended foster care were 90% more likely to be enrolled in secondary or postsecondary school when compared to 19-year-olds who had exited care to permanency at age 17 or 18. Lastly, for each year a young person participates in extended foster care, their likelihood of positive outcomes increases — including an 8% higher probability of completing high school or earning a GED and a 19% lower probability of experiencing homelessness or couch surfing.

Prescription drug price increases affect consumers, employers, private insurers, and taxpayers who fund programs like Medicare and Medicaid. This report is the latest in the AARP Public Policy Institute’s Rx Price Watch series, which analyzes price changes for widely used generic and specialty drug products. The series also analyzes the price changes for an overall market basket (i.e., brand-name, generic, and specialty drug products combined) to reflect the overall market impact of drug price changes. In 2024, retail prices increased for three-quarters of the widely used brand-name prescription drugs. However, retail prices decreased overall, largely due to inhaler and insulin products with outlier price decreases. Specifically, retail prices for 253 widely used brand-name drugs (i.e.,) decreased overall by an average of 1.4%. In contrast, the general inflation rate was 3% over the same period. Lastly, the average annual cost for one brand-name medication was nearly $13,000 in 2024, more than seven times higher than the average annual cost of therapy in 2006.