Download Free Child Care In Rural America Book in PDF and EPUB Free Download. You can read online Child Care In Rural America and write the review.

This policy brief examines who is taking care of preschoolers of employed mothers in rural America. While most rural families choose home-based child care (such as relatives or informal nonrelated care providers), formal care (such as in day care centers) has positive benefits to a child's development. The brief recommends that programs are needed that either make formal care more affordable and accessible in rural communities, or that train home-based care providers to provide quality care. (Contains 2 figures, 1 table, and 11 endnotes.).
Economic, social, and health indicators show that as many as one-quarter of rural children face problems usually attributed only to inner cities. Rural children are poorer than other American children and are less likely to have access to health insurance, health services, child care, government aid, or adequate housing. This book provides abundant statistical data (in text and tables) on various aspects of poverty in rural America as it affects children. It contains the following chapters: (1) Rural Children and Families: Who They Are; (2) The Rural Economic Landscape; (3) Child Poverty in Rural America; (4) Public Cash and Food Assistance for the Rural Poor; (5) the Health of Rural Children; (6) Rural Child Care and Early Childhood Education; (7) Rural Education; and (8) Rural Housing. Each chapter highlights problems faced in rural areas and makes frequent comparisons with urban data. The chapter on education discusses higher costs and limited curricula of rural schools, teacher experience and turnover, achievement scores, dropouts, youth outmigration, educational attainment, and college enrollment. Most chapters contain specific suggestions for national, state, and local governments and private entities to improve the plight of rural children. Sidebars highlight successful programs benefitting poor rural children. The appendix contains 13 additional tables that provide key state facts about children and the issues covered. (KS)
Abstract: Changes in welfare laws have lead to a growing number of mothers returning to the workforce, creating a growing need for stable non-maternal child care arrangements for young children. Finding and maintaining stable child care arrangements can be especially problematic for low-income women living in rural areas of the country. Accessibility and availability may be especially limited to these families due to factors such as irregular work schedules and financial constraints. The goal of the present study was to better understand what factors contribute to mothers' decisions to change their child care arrangements. Data from a national research endeavor called Rural Families Speak (N = 474) were utilized. The present study (N = 249) focuses on a subsample of those women. Inclusion required women to have at least one child 5 years old or younger. Data were collected from families with an income at or below 200% of the poverty line and who were living in rural counties with population centers of less than 20,000. Results indicated that the most utilized type of care was informal care (40.7%). More stability than was hypothesized was found with 67% of families who reported no change in child care arrangements. Most mothers (86.4%) changed child care arrangements because of some precipitating event. Of the 81 cases experiencing change, 45.7% indicated that the change in their child care arrangements was related to their employment. Three reasons given for changes in care were work related; the mother got a job or began attending school (23.5%), the mother stopped working or attending school (14.8%), or a change in the mother's work schedule (5%). Interview transcripts revealed seven non-work related categories of responses when considering what specifically motivated mothers to change child care arrangements including; the person who was currently providing child care became unavailable or unwilling to continue, financial considerations, and moving from the area. In light of these findings, current policies were discussed and changes were suggested that may encourage more stable child care for young children.
"A compilation of policy-relevant research by a multidisciplinary group of scholars on the state of families in rural America in the twenty-first century. Examines the impact of economic restructuring on rural Americans and provides policy recommendations for addressing the challenges they face"--Provided by publisher.
This report from the United States Children's Bureau examines the health and welfare of mothers and children in rural Mississippi during the early 20th century. Topics covered include prenatal care, infant mortality, and general living conditions. This work has been selected by scholars as being culturally important, and is part of the knowledge base of civilization as we know it. This work is in the "public domain in the United States of America, and possibly other nations. Within the United States, you may freely copy and distribute this work, as no entity (individual or corporate) has a copyright on the body of the work. Scholars believe, and we concur, that this work is important enough to be preserved, reproduced, and made generally available to the public. We appreciate your support of the preservation process, and thank you for being an important part of keeping this knowledge alive and relevant.
A century ago, most Americans had ties to the land. Now only one in fifty is engaged in farming and little more than a fourth live in rural communities. Though not new, this exodus from the land represents one of the great social movements of our age and is also symptomatic of an unparalleled transformation of our society. In Children of the Land, the authors ask whether traditional observations about farm families—strong intergenerational ties, productive roles for youth in work and social leadership, dedicated parents and a network of positive engagement in church, school, and community life—apply to three hundred Iowa children who have grown up with some tie to the land. The answer, as this study shows, is a resounding yes. In spite of the hardships they faced during the agricultural crisis of the 1980s, these children, whose lives we follow from the seventh grade to after high school graduation, proved to be remarkably successful, both academically and socially. A moving testament to the distinctly positive lifestyle of Iowa families with connections to the land, this uplifting book also suggests important routes to success for youths in other high risk settings.