Conditions of Children
Measures of children’s well-being — including education, health, economic conditions and family and community — at the national and state levels are included in the 2026 Kids Count Data Book published in June by The Annie E. Casey Foundation.
Thirty-two percent of respondents to The Trevor Project’s 2025 U.S. National Survey on the Mental Health of LGBTQ+ Young People reported experiencing verbal harassment in the past year while at school because people believed they were LGBTQ+.
About two-thirds of LGBTQ+ students reported feeling unsafe because of their identity in the 2024–25 school year, according to results from an annual survey by Glisten (formerly GLSEN).
SchoolHouse Connection, a national nonprofit that works to support those experiencing homelessness through early care and education, released an analysis in March of the latest federal data on identification, attendance, graduation rates and more.
Roughly one in four California students experiencing homelessness are in Los Angeles County, according to the UCLA Center for the Transformation of Schools’ March brief “Rising Numbers, Fading Resources: Students Experiencing Homelessness in Los Angeles County,”
The UCLA Center for the Transformation of Schools’ March brief “Hidden in Plain Sight: Fear, Underidentification, and Funding Gaps for Housing-Insecure Students in Los Angeles County” details the findings of a recent research study on the perspectives of staff, such as homeless liaisons, district coordinators and county officials, who are responsible for supporting the population’s academic success.
High school (53 percent), social media (31 percent) and their parents (21 percent) were the top sources rising college students whose own parents received higher education cited for learning about their future careers, according to the California Cradle-to-Career Data System’s student experience report for the 2025 academic year. For first-generation college goers, school (50 percent) and parents (38 percent) were top sources, followed by social media (27 percent).
According to YouthTruth’s recent report, School Safety, Security, & Emergency Preparedness: Understanding and Acting on How Students Experience Safety, students feel safer at school when their concerns are heard.
The recent report Preventing Youth Homelessness in Highly Marginalized Populations considers causes of youth homelessness and potential prevention strategies for five groups of young people who are disproportionately represented among those experiencing homelessness, and underrepresented in research and policy conversations.
The American School Counselor Association (ASCA) released a 2025 State of the Profession report, a comprehensive national study examining the current realities, challenges and strengths of school counseling programs.
