The FCD Child Well-Being Index (CWI) is a national, research-based composite measure updated annually that describes how young people in the United States have fared since 1975. The NATIONAL CWI, released publicly for the first time in 2004, is the nation’s most comprehensive measure of trends in the quality of life of children and youth. It combines national data from 28 indicators across seven domains into a single number that reflects overall child well-being. The seven quality-of-life domains are Family Economic Well-Being, Health, Safe/Risky Behavior, Educational Attainment, Community Engagement, Social Relationships, and Emotional/Spiritual Well-Being.
In 2012, FCD released its first STATE CWI. The STATE CWI draws from the most comprehensive set of data used to form a state index of child well-being. With these data, the STATE CWI ranks children's well-being for each state and compares them across states. In addition to state rankings, the STATE CWI includes findings about the strength of relationships between state policies and selected economic and demographic factors indicative of child well-being. It is based on 25 indicators clustered into the same seven domains used annually in the construction of the NATIONAL CWI.
During FCD’s centennial year, the Board approved a grant to examine the feasibility of developing an index that reflected the well-being of America’s children. The aim was to create a tool similar to the Consumer Price Index that would help policymakers and the public monitor how well children were doing. Kenneth Land, a social demographer at Duke University, oversees the continuing updates of the CWI. FCD will continue to support the annual updating and public release of the CWI through 2017.