Monday, March 12, 2012

Child welfare in Nebraska: Never mind the deck chairs, SAVE THE SHIP

Today, NCCPR releases a comprehensive report on child welfare in Nebraska, where the child welfare system sometimes seems to exist just to make the others look good.  This link   goes to the full report and supporting material, including more graphics like the one below, illustrating the state’s obscene rate of removal: 

Number of children taken from their homes
per thousand impoverished children, 2010:

                                                 IL    AL   US*   ME   FL    NE
                                                                              *National Average

Also today, on our blog at the trade journal Youth Today, we look at one of Nebraska's key child welfare failures:  a truancy law that eliminates all distinction between an excused and an unexcused absence from school.  The law turns children into criminals, and subjects their parents to child abuse investigations, if they keep the children home from school for too many days for any reason – even serious illness.