Half of All Black Kids in Michigan Live in Concentrated Poverty
“We cannot put children on the back burner.”
A new study on childhood poverty was recently released by the Annie E Casey Foundation. In it, African-American and Native American children were found to be seven times more likely than white kids to live in high-poverty neighborhoods. And in Michigan, one of every two African-American children are living in concentrated poverty — that means living in an area where everyone is poor.
The problem is especially relevant in cities like Detroit, where the recession hit communities hard who were never able to fully recover.
So what does this mean for kids of color? And what can we do, along with community leaders and stakeholders, to try to address this problem and all of the negative impacts it can have for our young people?
“Leaders in this community have decided that we cannot put children on the back burner; we need to put that on the front,” says Skillman Foundation President & CEO Tonya Allen on Detroit Today with Stephen Henderson.
Allen emphasizes the need to more after school programs for kids in Detroit, more stability for those programs, and a shift in attitude and support for public schools.
“We need to make sure that we’re dealing with the whole child, that we’re giving them the emotional supports that they need,” she says.
