A Practitioner's Guide to Using Child Indicators

This book focuses on projects using child indicators outside of a research context and provides a user-friendly set of materials to help professionals or organizations start and sustain high-quality child indicator projects. The book is based on the fundamental idea that better data leads to better decisions regarding programs for children. The number of people with experience and expertise in developing child indicator projects is limited in many countries. This initiative provides critical information on the topic in a cost-effective manner, and thereby fills an important niche regarding the use of child indicators. To the extent that it promotes more and better child indicator projects, the book leads to more attention for children and better decision-making regarding public support for children. It is also likely to increase the number of such projects that exist and to improve the quality of such projects. This easy-to-use and practical guide is for all professionals and organizations working with child indicators data. Sponsoring Organizations Acknowledgements Contents Chapter 1: Introduction and Overview 1.1 Introduction and Overview 1.2 Key Terms and Concepts 1.3 Development of the Child Indicator Field 1.4 Connections to Child Indicator Movement 1.5 The Development of an Organizational Infrastructure 1.6 Why Data and Research Are Particularly Important for Children 1.7 Sorting out Scholarship and Advocacy 1.8 Contents of this Publication 1.9 The Audience for this Material References Chapter 2: Analytic Frameworks and Perspectives for Measuring Child Well-being 2.1 Introduction 2.2 The United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child 2.3 Child Development Perspective 2.4 Ecological Model of Child Well-being 2.5 Sociology of Children 2.6 Subjective Child Well-being Measures References Chapter 3: Uses of Child Well-being Indicators 3.1 Introduction 3.2 Increasing Public Awareness about Child Well-being 3.2.1 International Reports (Reports Including More than One Country) 3.2.2 Country Reports 3.3 Monitoring Child Well-being 3.4 Goal Setting for Child Well-being 3.5 Evaluating Programs and Policies Related to Children 3.6 Identifying Child-Centered Problems 3.7 Using Indicators in Research and Analysis References Chapter 4: Developing and Evaluating a Set of Child Well-being Indicators 4.1 Introduction 4.2 What Is an Indicator of Child Well-being? 4.3 Statistics and Indicators 4.4 Indicators for Individuals and Population Indicators 4.5 Key Questions Related to Indicator Selection 4.6 Roles and Relationships 4.6.1 Getting Stakeholder Input 4.6.2 Using a Data Partner 4.6.3 Relationships with Agencies 4.7 Identifying Indicators of Interest 4.7.1 Domains of Well-being 4.7.2 How Many Indicators Do I Need? 4.8 Where to Look for Potential Indicators 4.8.1 Administrative Data and Survey Data 4.9 Different Forms of Availability of Data 4.10 Selection Criteria and Considerations 4.10.1 Accuracy 4.10.2 Consistency and Comparability 4.10.3 Completeness 4.10.4 Readily Understandable 4.10.5 Balanced 4.10.6 Relevance to the Agenda 4.10.7 Using a Strategic Unit of Geography 4.10.8 Timeliness of the Data 4.10.9 Positive Indicators or Assets 4.11 Limitations of Data References Chapter 5: Data Analysis and Tabulation 5.1 Introduction 5.2 Description and Analysis 5.3 Level or Type of Statistical Analysis 5.4 Comparative Analysis 5.4.1 Comparisons Over Time 5.4.2 Comparisons Across Groups 5.4.3 Comparisons Across Geographic Units 5.5 Comparisons Using Ranking 5.6 Identifying Specific Place Names 5.7 Use of Statistical Significance Testing 5.8 Building an Index of Child Well-Being 5.9 The Issue of False Precision 5.10 The Challenge of Disaggregation of Data 5.11 Understanding the Meaning of Numbers and Rates 5.12 Outliers 5.13 Data Limitations References Chapter 6: Producing a Report and Disseminating Data 6.1 Introduction 6.2 Understanding the Audience 6.3 Communication and Child Indicators 6.4 Strategic and Opportunistic Communication 6.5 Presenting Data from a Comparative Perspective 6.6 Paper or Computers? 6.7 Should Reports be Produced Every Year? 6.8 Working with an Editor 6.9 Graphs and Maps 6.9.1 Line Graph 6.9.2 Bar Charts 6.9.3 Pie Charts 6.9.4 Maps 6.10 Auxiliary Products References Chapter 7: Examples of Indicator Projects and Reports 7.1 Introduction 7.2 UNICEF Innocenti Research Centre Report Cards 7.3 The UNICEF Multiple Indicator Cluster Surveys (MICS) 7.4 The Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) 7.5 KIDS COUNT Project 7.6 America ́s Children: Key Indicators of Well-Being 7.7 KIDS COUNT on the Eastern Shore of Virginia 7.8 Kids Count Mexico 7.9 The Field of Child Indicators Studies in South Korea 7.10 Quebec, Canada 7.10.1 Our Target Audiences 7.10.2 How They Work 7.10.3 Our Publications 7.10.4 Biggest Achievement References