This publication is the second installment in the Race for Results case study series. It features an inside look at how the W. Haywood Burns Institute and the Kirwan Institute for the Study of Race and Social Policy use disaggregated data on race and ethnicity to improve the lives of children and communities. These examples illustrate why the collection, analysis and use of race and ethnicity data should be an integral part of any strategy, initiative or legislative agenda affecting children, families and communities.
Typically, public institutions and systems report data on whole populations. However, greater access to and breakdown of racial data helps to underscore racial trends and disparities more clearly and will provide greater accountability in policymaking.
Disaggregating data by race found that Latina youth were 46% of the Ventura County, CA, population, but made up 70% of detention center admissions.
Even in Minnesota — ranked number one in child well-being in the KIDS COUNT Data Book — disaggregated data by race revealed that while 3% of white kids were living in extreme poverty, up to 21% of American Indian and 18% of African-American kids were living in the same extreme poverty conditions.
Opportunity Mapping in Columbus, Ohio, revealed that areas with no infant deaths were adjacent to neighborhoods of color with infant death rates as high as those in Central America.
