The Joint Citizens and Legislative Committee on Children has released its 2026 Annual Report and 2026 Data Reference Book. Both draw on testimony from 270 speakers at the Committee’s fall 2025 public hearings in Columbia, Florence, Greenville, Charleston, and Aiken, along with data reported by state agencies.
Several findings bear directly on the students South Carolina school psychologists serve.
What the data show
Mental health and safety
- Child suicides rose from 21 in 2024 to 36 in 2025 — the highest number reported since 2020.
- Firearms are the leading cause of death among South Carolina children ages 1 to 17, with gun deaths rising from 64 to 68.
- 28,014 children received mental health services through the South Carolina Office of Mental Health in 2025.
Students in our buildings
- 17,156 students were identified as homeless during the 2024–2025 school year — an 8% increase over the prior year, and a 59% increase since 2020–2021.
- 110,070 students ages 3 to 17 received special education and related services.
- 79,099 students were identified as multilingual learners.
- Child poverty declined to 18.1%, though South Carolina remains above the national rate of 15.5%.
Signs of progress
- Juvenile delinquency referrals to the Department of Juvenile Justice declined 9%, and child deaths declined 7%.
- The Office of Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities served 3% more children, from 9,510 to 9,807.
- The four-year graduation rate rose to 86.7%.
South Carolina ranked 38th nationally for overall child well-being in the Annie E. Casey Foundation’s 2025 KIDS COUNT Data Book. More than 1.1 million children under 18 live in the state.
Handle With Care
Of the seven issues examined in the Annual Report, Handle With Care is the one that runs directly through our buildings. The program allows first responders to notify a school when a student has been present at a traumatic event. No details about the incident are shared — the notification simply indicates that the child should be “handled with care.” School staff then determine what support, if any, is appropriate.
Handle With Care currently operates in eight South Carolina counties. The Committee recommends continued expansion into additional communities, along with statewide data collection to evaluate the program’s effectiveness.
Other issues in the report
The Committee also examined postsecondary tuition waivers for youth with foster care experience under the proposed Fostering Futures Act; sales tax on diapers, baby formula, and baby food; SUN Bucks summer nutrition benefits, which South Carolina is one of twelve states not to offer in 2026; the state’s lifetime SNAP and TANF ban tied to certain felony drug convictions, the last full ban of its kind in the country; refundability of the state Earned Income Tax Credit; and a direct legal representation pilot for children in abuse and neglect proceedings, launched in January 2026 in Berkeley, Clarendon, and Sumter counties.
Read the reports
- 2026 Annual Report (PDF)
- 2026 Data Reference Book (PDF)
Recommendations described above are those of the Joint Citizens and Legislative Committee on Children. They are shared here for member awareness and do not represent positions adopted by SCASP.
Leave a Reply