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Colorado has moved up five spots to 12th among the states in the 2025 Kids Count Data Book released Monday by the Annie E. Casey Foundation, which ranks states for child well-being.

Colorado has solid scores for education, health care and for family and community indicators including low teen birth rates. But families continue to face economic challenges, largely driven by a lack of affordable housing.

Maya Gould, vice president of research for the Colorado Children's Campaign, said this year's data showed more work needs to be done to ensure all kids can thrive.

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"Children in Colorado have a particularly high housing cost burden," Gould pointed out. "Thirty-one percent of kids are living in households where the parents have to pay 30 percent or more of their income to afford rent."

While Colorado kids are doing better in school when compared to their peers in other states, student scores were lower than last year, with 64 percent of fourth graders are proficient in reading, and nearly 70 percent of eighth graders not proficient in math.

Leslie Boissiere, vice president of external affairs for the Annie E. Casey Foundation, said the nation should not lose sight of the racial disparities still seen in the report's 16 well-being indicators, particularly among Black, Latino and Native American children.

"For example, the child well-being outcomes on 15 out of 16 indicators for Native kids are lower than the national average," Boissiere pointed out. "If you look at Black kids, it's eight out of 16 indicators, where Black kids' outcomes are lower than the national average."

Federal funding has helped Colorado improve child well-being in key areas. But Gould cautioned if Congress makes cuts to programs like Medicaid, SNAP, CHIP and Head Start, the state's Taxpayer's Bill of Rights limits state lawmakers' ability to raise revenues to cover any shortfalls.

"We're worried that we're going to lose a lot of the progress we've made in helping kids access affordable health care, access affordable child care, which also helps parents get to work," Gould noted.