Looking back across my son’s 13 years of elementary, middle, and high school education, I would do some things differently. When he was in 3rd grade, my son was identified with a disability, and while he thrived in so many ways, I would have made different choices along the way if I had known then what I know now. Being a teacher as well as a mom of a child with a disability certainly had [...]
Mornings during the school year are chaos at our house, and there are many times when it would be easier to turn off the alarm and just let us all stay in bed for the day. However, like most parents, I value the education of my children and therefore drag myself out of bed to ensure I am doing my part by sending them to school on time. The “on time” part is frequently a [...]
When we think of homelessness, we usually imagine shelters or living on the street. Yet, homelessness among children and families is much more than living in non-habitable environments. The federal McKinney-Vento Act and the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) have tried to capture what homelessness really means and expand the definition to include families or children fleeing domestic violence situations; families or children living with relatives or friends as temporary housing; families that [...]
New data released today by the U.S. Census Bureau revealed that more than one in every four Kentucky children live in poverty. The American Community Survey 1-year 2014 estimate showed 26.2 percent of Kentucky children lived in poverty, which was not a significant change from the 2013 estimate. However, the percent of Kentucky children living in poverty remains higher than when the recession began in 2008 (23.5 percent). There are three ways in which we [...]
New health insurance data released today by the U.S. Census Bureau revealed that health insurance coverage rates for both children and adults increased in Kentucky from 2013 to 2014. The one-year estimates from the American Community Survey revealed that 95.7 percent of Kentucky children under 18 had health insurance in 2014, compared with 94.1 percent in 2013. This is an estimated increase of 16,000 children. In addition, coverage for those under age 65, which includes [...]
In the U.S. there are 2.7 million grandparents raising their grandchildren under age 18, with 55,000 of them in Kentucky alone. There are several reasons for grandparents to raise their grandchildren, including parental death, parental substance abuse, military deployment, child abuse and neglect, parental mental and physical health issues, and parental disability. Research tells us that grandparents raising their grandchildren, as well as other relatives raising kids, known as kinship care, is good for children [...]
For families at risk of child abuse and neglect, family preservation services work with caregivers to alleviate issues in a home and promote a safe home environment for the child. Children do best when they are in families, and we know that whenever possible, children should remain at home with their parents and when needed, receive services to preserve the family. In Kentucky, a large percentage of child victims of abuse and neglect have risk [...]
Kentucky’s children will have newly trained allies in the effort to erase child abuse thanks to the Kentucky General Assembly: their teachers. In March 2015, our legislature passed Senate Bill 119 which ensures that educators receive information on the prevention and recognition of all forms of abuse and neglect. Previously, educators were notified that they were required to report child abuse, but many were not given specialized information on how to recognize the subtle early [...]
As of August 18, the Department for Medicaid Services (DMS) wants its members to update their current address in its system. If DMS receives any returned mail from an address that is not current, members could lose health coverage. If an address appears incorrect, the member will have the remainder of that month plus another month to update the address. If you have Medicaid and have recently moved, please update your address with DMS. If [...]
As a former educator, I know that one of the most complicated, and I’d venture to say one of the most critical aspects of teaching children is the management of the various behaviors in the classroom. And as a mom, I know how frustrated I get when I try to provide various types of discipline to my three very different kids. Not one of the three respond to a certain method in the same way. [...]
