Michigan’s national education standing sounds alarm bells

A version of this column originally appeared in Michigan Advance.

Michigan continues to lag behind most other states when it comes to education, underscoring the vital importance of helping kids to be present and successful in their classrooms. A good way to start? Make sure families have what they need to make ends meet. 

According to the 2024 KIDS COUNT® Data Book — the latest 50-state report on child well-being from the Annie E. Casey Foundation — Michigan remains in the bottom 10 states for education, at 41st. This is, once again, our state’s worst ranking in four domains that include economic well-being (31st), family and community (28th) and health (22nd). Additionally, Michigan continues to rank in the bottom half of states for overall child well-being, at 34th, which is slightly worse than last year’s ranking of 32nd. 

This data should sound alarm bells for those in our state making decisions about how schools are resourced and how we support families who are struggling to make ends meet, many of whom have been left out of prosperity due to past and present-day racial discrimination. While the pandemic has undoubtedly contributed to some of the learning loss we see in the data, the Casey Foundation contends — and we agree — that it is not the sole cause. For decades, U.S. reading and math scores have hardly seen improvement, and the pandemic only exacerbated this trend.

Also contributing to Michigan’s education ranking is the state’s 40% chronic school absenteeism rate, which is well above the national rate of 30%. Over half a million Michigan students were chronically absent during the 2021-2022 school year, and among those students there were significant racial disparities, with more than half of American Indian and Black children persistently not present in their classrooms. 

It’s important to note that absence in school is associated with childhood poverty and trauma — two other areas where our state is sadly not doing well. Michigan’s child poverty rate is slightly above the national average at 18%, and nearly half of our state’s kids have gone through at least one adverse childhood experience. Adverse childhood experiences, or ACEs, are traumatic events such as abuse, neglect, household violence, caregiver mental illness or any other aspect of a child’s environment that undermines their safety and/or stability. ACEs can have lifelong impacts on a child and certainly impact their ability to show up and be ready to learn at school.

To build a better state for our kids, we must make sure they arrive at the classroom ready to learn by continuing to provide universal free school meals and ensuring safe transportation to and from school, reliable home internet connections, quiet places to study, and dedicated time with teachers, counselors and tutors. Improving attendance tracking and using positive approaches to address chronic absenteeism can also go a long way in lifting up kids who are falling behind.   

The 2024 state budget went a long way toward helping the schools and students that need it most, and we expect that those investments — which we hope will increase in the 2025 state budget — will help Michigan climb up the rankings. 

 Additionally, some Michigan schools may still have Elementary and Secondary School Emergency Relief, or ESSER, funds available to help boost achievement, but those funds need to be allocated by the end of this September or they will lose them. 

The learning loss that Michigan and many other states experienced during the pandemic has also taught us an important lesson about the need to support families so that young learners have a solid foundation at home too. Supporting schools that offer wrap-around services, addressing child poverty by adopting a state Child Tax Credit, making improvements to the Family Independence Program and exploring other, innovative ways to provide direct cash support to struggling families is essential to the well-being of our state’s kids and their academic futures.

Improving student outcomes is critical to addressing Michigan’s population challenges, which is why one of the Growing Michigan Together Council workgroups specifically focused on and made recommendations to improve our PreK-12 education system. If we want to improve our population trajectory, we must focus on retaining residents and attracting new residents, which will be difficult to do if our schools and students continue to struggle. 

There is so much at stake in addressing Michigan’s education crisis, including the future growth and economic prosperity of our state, but Michigan’s vibrant kids are at the heart of it all. 

Let’s make the right choices and give them a future filled with opportunities.