by the Sun-News Editorial Board, Las Cruces Sun-News
June 30, 2018

We can no longer refer to the annual childhood well-being rankings as a “wake-up call” for the state. The same alarm goes off every summer, and each time it does New Mexico rolls over and hits the “snooze” button.

This year, after four years of being ranked next to last in the annual Kids Count report, New Mexico has dropped to the very bottom of the list. Public officials in Louisiana are thanking God for us.

The report, put out by the Annie E. Casey Foundation and its network of state partners, ranks states in 16 measures of child well-being. There are four main categories: economic well-being; education; health; and family and community. New Mexico ranked last in education, and did not rank higher than 48th in any category.

Perhaps most discouraging is that we are not seeing any improvement from one year to the next. Instead, there was a decline in eight of the 16 categories, no change in two categories and improvement in just six.

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