Here's a GREAT article to show how the "younger diversity soon to be harder working" California children are growing up (a retort to the SF Chronical article, "California young people boost diversity".... Now you know why it is SO IMPORTANT to ensure these illegal parents burdening the legal U.S. Citizens with their "poverty anchor babies" get DEPORTED!!!

Poverty figures rise among O.C. schoolchildren

November 29, 2009
By SCOTT MARTINDALE
THE ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER



More than 12 percent of school-age children in Orange County are living in poverty – the highest level since 2005 – with 3.5 times that number receiving free or subsidized meals daily, according to federal poverty data released this month.

The number of impoverished children ages 5 to 17 jumped by 6,188 in a single year, to an estimated 67,062 now in Orange County. Meanwhile, a much larger portion of the county's students – 43 percent – is receiving free or subsidized meals in school.

"There are a lot of very needy kids in Orange County," said Renee Hendrick, the Orange County Department of Education's executive director for business services. "The cost of living is much higher in Orange County (than the nation as a whole) and the needs are greater. We have a lot of students who come from homes where they don't have regular meals."

Orange County's highest concentration of impoverished children is in the 6,300-pupil Magnolia Elementary School District, which serves western Anaheim and portions of Stanton and has a poverty rate of 20 percent.

Magnolia is followed by the 57,400-student Santa Ana Unified School District, which serves much of Santa Ana and has a poverty rate of 19.8 percent.

The number of students receiving free or subsidized meals is 73 percent in the Magnolia district and 83 percent in Santa Ana Unified.

Poverty rates and school meal subsidy rates are typically very different because families can be 185 percent above the federal poverty level and still qualify for a subsidized meal.

Even so, this leeway might not be enough to keep some children from coming to school hungry, officials say.

A family of four, for example, must have an annual household income of less than $22,050 to be considered living in poverty, and an income of less than $40,793 to qualify for a subsidized meal.

"This is the same eligibility scale they use for every other state in the nation," said Brenda Padilla, the California Department of Education's assistant director for nutrition services. "People are probably living in (poverty-like conditions) and still don't qualify."

Poverty statistics for each school district in the nation are compiled annually by the U.S. Census Bureau. The figures are projected estimates based on data from the prior year, including federal tax information, food assistance data and the results of the American Community Survey and the most recent census.

Federal education officials rely on the annual data to determine how much Title I federal poverty funding schools receive.

Orange County has many students living just above the federal poverty line. The county's school meal subsidy rate is 3.5 times higher than its school poverty rate, a phenomenon that may reflect the high cost of living here and the economic downturn, officials say.

Nationally, the meal subsidy rate in any given area is, on average, about 2.5 times higher than the student poverty rate, according to the U.S. Census Bureau. But the disparity can vary widely, depending on the spread of income levels in a particular community.

"It could be equal, or six, seven, eight times greater," said Wes Basel, team leader for the U.S. Census Bureau's Small Area Income and Poverty Estimates program.

Furthermore, the 12.2 percent poverty rate among Orange County children is higher than county's rate as a whole. The overall poverty rate in Orange County stands at 9.9 percent, up from 8.9 percent a year ago.

http://www.ocregister.com/news/poverty- ... rcent.html