Getting to Know Your International Contacts—Part 1

I have not received a response from the people I've reached out to, so I am using the alternative. Also, the website, www.childpoverty.org is down, so I researched www.nccp.com. I chose one of their publications: Basic Facts About Low-income Children. Children Under 6 years, 2011. The fact sheet gives a description of demographic, socio-economic, and geographic characteristics of young children and their parents, living in the United States.

Three insights I've gained:

• The highest races that live in low-income families are American Indian 70%, African American 70%, and Hispanic 67%. However, 4.2 million white children live in low-income families, making them the largest group and Hispanics are the largest origin of children living in low-income families.
• 75% of children under 6 years old with a single parent, live in low-income families.
• 52 % of children under 6 years old in the South, live in low-income families.

These facts stood out to me because I am an African American woman and I live in the South. While, my parents are married, I have friends that grew up in a single-parent households and had struggling times. I chose the fact sheet that discussed children under 6 because that is the age group that I work with. It's a repeating factor and it's sad.

"I mean, nobody should be hitting Lotto for 36 million and we got people starving in the streets. That is not idealistic, that’s just real." -Tupac Shakur

Seeing this quote today made me question myself: What am I doing to help someone in need? It's time for me to take action in my own community, so this is what I've gained from this week's trend and topic. We have to be the change that we want to see in the world.