Each year, new families participating in our funded programs complete a survey when they start services, providing us with demographic information about the children and families served by these programs. Last year 2,951 parents completed the survey. Here’s what we learned:

• Our families struggle to make ends meet.
  • 30% earn less than $15,000 per year; while 33% earn between $15,000 and $30,000. Nearly one-third of mothers served do not have a high school diploma or GED.

• Most parents identify their race/ethnicity as a person of color.
  • 50% of families speak primarily Spanish in the home.

• Parents are routinely reading to their children.
  
  • 89% of families read to their child at least weekly; with 70% reading between 3-7 times per week and 27% reading to their child every day.

• Parents are concerned about their child’s development.
  • 27% of parents have a concern that their child is not developing like other children, and 20% of parents said that their child had already been identified with a developmental delay or disability.

• Most children have health insurance.
  • 69% of children have Medi-Cal coverage (includes 3% with Healthy Families-CHIP); while only 1% do not have health insurance. 94% of children have a regular health care provider for well-child check-ups.

• Children are still exposed to secondhand smoke.
  • 15% of children have been exposed to second hand tobacco smoke at home.

In addition, it’s interesting to learn that one in three parents who completed the survey had already visited a First 5 Center, and most of the families (78%) had a child under age three. We are in the process of evaluating data collected from last fiscal year and will highlight outcomes on our Data Dashboard once completed.