Florencia Gutiérrez, Senior Research Associate, The Annie E. Casey Foundation
For more than three decades, through the Annie E. Casey Foundation’s KIDS COUNT® project, decisionmakers and communities have had access to reliable national, state, and local data to improve outcomes for all children, young people, and families in this country. KIDS COUNT comprises the foundation’s national KIDS COUNT publications—the annual KIDS COUNT Data Book and periodic reports such as Race for Results; the KIDS COUNT Data Center, a resource for year-round national, state, and local data; and the KIDS COUNT Network of state-based partner organizations that help policymakers, advocates, journalists, and community leaders understand and use data to make informed decisions.
I’ve spent most of my career working on KIDS COUNT and have come to appreciate the effectiveness of how these resources work together. I’ve learned that data are most valuable not simply because they exist, but because they are accessible, trusted, and useful to spark informed conversations and better decisions that improve the lives of people and communities.
None of this work would be possible without the nation’s public data infrastructure. Every KIDS COUNT child well-being indicator comes from federal statistical agencies. These data make it possible to understand how children and families are faring, identify emerging challenges, measure progress over time, and evaluate whether policies and investments are making a difference.
We often take public data for granted, but they are the foundation on which evidence-based policymaking rests. KIDS COUNT has taught me important lessons about building trust, strengthening partnerships, and helping people use data to improve outcomes for children, young people, and families.
Lesson No. 1: Local expertise is essential to turn data into action.
One of the greatest strengths of KIDS COUNT is that it brings together trusted information, accessible tools, and local expertise to elevate the issues affecting children, spark informed conversations, and support better decisions that improve child outcomes.
Each year, the KIDS COUNT® Data Book highlights key trends in child well-being, while the KIDS COUNT Data Center provides access to thousands of year-round national, state, and local indicators. But having access to reliable data is only the first step. The real value of data lies in how people use them to inform decisions that improve lives.
That is where the KIDS COUNT Network becomes essential. KIDS COUNT organizations across all 50 states, the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico, and the U.S. Virgin Islands help people understand what the data mean in the context of their own communities. By combining data with state and local context, we can explain the trends and use those insights to inform conversations, shape policy, and support decisions that improve outcomes for children, families, and the communities where they live. Data are transformed into action.
Lesson No. 2: Feedback can improve data collection and presentation.
One of the most important changes in this year’s KIDS COUNT Data Book came directly from listening to our partners and people who use the KIDS COUNT data products.
Rankings are the most recognized feature of the Data Book. KIDS COUNT Network partners and other data users pointed out that while rankings show how states compare with one another, they do not show whether children in a state are doing better or worse over time. For organizations working to improve child well-being, understanding progress over time is just as important—sometimes more important—than understanding how their state compares to others.
This feedback helped the Casey Foundation shape an enhanced index, which we introduced in the 2026 KIDS COUNT Data Book. In addition to state rankings, which show how states compare with one another, each state now receives scores benchmarked to 2019 that measure progress over time. This gives policymakers and advocates a more meaningful way to assess what’s working, identify persistent challenges, and inform future action.
This example illustrates how the most meaningful innovations often come from listening carefully to the people who rely on data every day and then adapting tools to better meet their needs.
Lesson No. 3: Public data matter.
When I started working on KIDS COUNT nearly two decades ago, I didn’t fully appreciate the extent to which the foundation’s ability to understand how children are faring depends on strong federal public data.
Every indicator the Casey Foundation makes available through its KIDS COUNT publications and Data Center comes from federal statistical agencies. Those same data help answer questions that matter every day: Are children healthy? Are families able to afford housing? Are students recovering academically? Are communities making progress?
Federal data also inform decisions about how federal dollars are distributed to states to support child well-being. They help policymakers, researchers, philanthropic organizations, and communities understand where needs exist and whether policies are making a difference.
I’ve come to realize these data are critical for me to do my job. Just as we rely on roads to move people and goods, we rely on trusted public data to understand problems, target resources, measure progress, and hold ourselves accountable.
We all pay the price when the public data infrastructure is weakened. Decisionmakers, advocates, and organizations like the Annie E. Casey Foundation have less data to guide investments, advocate for change and improve outcomes for children, families and communities.
Lesson No. 4: Philanthropy can play a role.
Data alone don’t improve outcomes for children. Data must be paired with analysis, effective communications, trusted messengers, and advocacy to influence decisions. That means foundations need to invest not only in data, but also in the systems that produce data, partnerships to interpret and use this information, and capacity that helps people turn evidence into action.
As new technologies, administrative data, and artificial intelligence reshape how information is collected and used, philanthropy has an opportunity to shape what comes next. We should embrace innovation while preserving the principles that have made our public data systems valuable: independence, transparency, quality, privacy, and public trust.
Decisions affecting people and communities are strongest when they are grounded in evidence rather than assumption. Investing in and sharing reliable public data will help decision makers take action to ensure a brighter future for us all.