SPRINGFIELD - Gov. Bruce Rauner’s Cabinet on Children and Youth turned on a new data dashboard today that policymakers and the public can use to make better-informed decisions about the health, safety, education and work readiness of Illinoisans younger than 25.
“When it comes to policy, we know the best decisions for children and families are those that are data-driven,” Rauner said. “Since our goal is equity, we must constantly look at the data and research to drive our work.”
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The Illinois Department of Innovation and Technology created the dashboard to advance the aims of cabinet member agencies, including the Governor’s Office of Early Childhood Development and the departments of Public Health and Commerce and Economic Opportunity.
Julio Rodriguez, DCEO deputy director of the Office of Employment and Training, said the dashboard will help the agency to focus its career-assistance programs.
“It will help us track the success of the Apprenticeship PLUS initiative that was launched earlier this year,” Rodriguez said, “and it will allow the department to identify more ways to help youth make informed career choices.”
The new dashboard can be viewed at the Children’s Cabinet website. It will track data in four categories — education, self-sufficiency, safety and health.
Kirk Lonbom, acting secretary at the Department of Innovation & Technology, said the dashboard will cover 42 metrics, pulling together public information from multiple Illinois agencies.
“Our data analytics team at DoIT is pleased to provide a system that can improve the lives of children in our state,” Lonbom said.
Education data points will include post-secondary retention rates and reading levels. Self-sufficiency measures include education attainment levels, median earnings for youth at 25 and student debt default rates. The safety data will track the percentage of youth living in “safe” neighborhoods, rates of domestic violence, incarceration and recidivism rates among other subjects.
Illinois Department of Public Health Director Dr. Nirav Shah said the data will be key in youth health decision-making. And Cynthia Tate, executive director of the Governor’s Office of Early Childhood Development, said the dashboard will provide a bird’s-eye view of the state of Illinois’ children and youth.
“Having this broad spectrum of data available in one place will help prioritize population health goals,” Shah said.
“This forms the bedrock of the Children’s Cabinet project on early childhood workforce development and the GOECD’s mission,” added Tate. “The dashboard helps to connect each of the cabinet projects and serves as a long-term barometer on our work.”
