The 2025 Kentucky KIDS COUNT Data Dashboard by Kentucky Youth Advocates highlights the latest data across 16 measures of child well-being. 

The Kentucky KIDS COUNT project displays data across the following domains: economic security, education, health, and family & community to illustrate whether outcomes for children across the Commonwealth have improved, worsened, or stayed the same compared to baseline data. 

These county and state-level data benchmarks provide critical insight for how policymakers, advocates, and community members can secure better futures for all children in Kentucky. 

Economic Security:

  • While child poverty rates have improved since 2018, it remains a pervasive issue in Kentucky with 20.2% of children living in poverty. 
    • The data reveals racial disparities in child poverty with 31% of Black children living in poverty compared to 17% of white children in 2024. 
  • 21.1% of Kentucky children live in food-insecure households with rates worsening in 119  counties since 2021. 

Education:

  • 46% of kindergarteners entered school ready to learn compared to 51% in the 2019/2020 school year. 
  • Kentucky saw improvements in eighth-grade math proficiency with 40% of eighth graders scoring proficient or higher in math compared to 37% in the 2023 – 2024 school year.
  • Only 50% of fourth-grade students scored proficient in reading. 

Health:

  • 96.7% of children under 19 had health insurance in 2023
    • 89% Latinx children under 19 had health insurance 

Family and Community:

  • The rate of children in foster care in Kentucky declined to 39.4 per 1,000 children from 51.1 per 1,000 children in 2017-2019. 
  • Kentucky also saw a slight improvement in the percentage of children exiting foster care to reunification. 

While the 2025 Data Dashboard shows improvements across several areas of child well-being, the data underscores the need to strengthen economic supports for families to reduce financial stress and instability. 

The environments that surround our kids and families shape their outcomes. Adverse community environments that lead to adverse childhood experiences can be mitigated when decision-makers create the right conditions through policy and budgetary investments. 

The Bounce Coalition is committed to advancing this vision by building the resilience of children, adults, and families by improving knowledge about the impact of ACEs and the skills to help people bounce back from adversity. Through partnerships, training opportunities, intentional interventions, and evaluative services, we aim to create environments where every Kentucky child has the opportunity to thrive.