DENVER — An annual report on the state of Colorado's children shows improvements in insurance coverage and suicides, but a sharp increase in homelessness.
The Kids Count in Colorado Data Book is a snapshot of the health, economic stability, and education of the state's 1.2 million children. For more than 30 years, the Colorado Children's Campaign, a nonprofit, nonpartisan group, has published this report to help state leaders craft laws and policies to improve the lives of Colorado children.
- Read the Kids Count in Colorado 2025 Data Book below
This year's report found that 4,781 children experienced homelessness in 2024, which is double the number from the year before (2,291). The research also shows that the number of public-school children identified as homeless increased by 28% between the 2022-2023 and the 2023-2024 school years.
"That was our most startling finding of this whole report. The number of children experiencing homelessness really skyrocketed in the last year," said Maya Gould, vice president of research at Colorado Children's Campaign.
The report is by no means all bad news. For example, there are far more Colorado children covered by health insurance. The report shows 4% of Colorado children under 19 were uninsured in 2023, which is down from 9% in 2013.
"That was something that was really encouraging this year. We saw that the rate of uninsured children in Colorado dropped to 4% in 2023. But even more positive was we saw in the most recent fiscal year that a lot more children were enrolled in CHP Plus than we expected. That is starting to indicate to us that after the pandemic ended and a lot of those policies ended and kicked kids off Medicaid, that they were then picked up by another public health insurance," said Gould.
The Kids Count in Colorado Data Book also found that preschool attendance is way up. More than two-thirds of Colorado 4-year-olds participated in the state's universal preschool program. In its first year, the program provided free, part-time preschool to more than 40,000 kids.
Childcare capacity also increased in the last year. Between September 2023 and September 2024, the state added 4,000 openings for children under 6 and 6,000 for school-age kids.
Chronic school absenteeism is down notably. The number of students missing 10% or more of school days dropped to 28% from a record high of 35% during the COVID-19 pandemic.
The mental health of teenagers is also improving. The survey found that between 2021 and 2023, more high schoolers reported feeling able to manage their stress, and “fewer high schoolers reported feeling consistently sad and hopeless or considering suicide.”
That is reflected in the number of Colorado teens who died by suicide. The rate of teenagers ages 15 to 19 who died as a result of suicide decreased to 14.6 deaths per 100,000 teens in 2023, down from 18.1 deaths in 2016.
