Issues

How do we Prioritize Issues?

VOICES works to improve the well-being of all Alabama children from birth through age 18. That means we care about the full range of issues affecting children and families — from every aspect of a child’s life.

These issues are interconnected. Health affects learning. Family income affects housing stability. Early experiences shape lifelong outcomes. Because of this, we look at the whole child and the systems that support them.

We Can’t Do Everything at Once — So We Follow the Data

While we care about every issue impacting children, we have to focus our time and resources where they can make the greatest difference.

Our priorities are guided by the child well-being data we collect and analyze. We regularly examine key information on how Alabama’s children and families are doing, organized into four domains: health, safety, education, and economic security.

Click Here to View VFAC's Advocacy Toolkit!

Health

Child well-being includes physical, mental, emotional, social, and intellectual growth. Children thrive with loving families, safe homes, and supportive communities, equipped with caring adults who can guide them.

Education

High-quality pre-k and K-12 education helps prepare students with the skills they need to succeed in a fast-changing, technology-driven world, while opening doors to greater economic opportunities and improving overall quality of life.

Safety

Keeping children safe means protecting them from physical and emotional harm while creating spaces where they feel safe, secure and supported.

Economic Security

Economic opportunity in Alabama is not sorted out equally, and this domain section serves to capture data detailing the scope of poverty, and the social welfare burden on families across the state. It is important that we look at how many families have access to the proper resources and healthy choices in food. 

Data-Driven. Child-Focused. Impact-Oriented.

Our approach is grounded in three principles: 

  1. Focus on what matters most.
    We prioritize the issues that the data show are most urgent or have the greatest long-term impact.
  1. Respond to emerging trends.
    As child well-being indicators shift, our priorities can shift too. 
  1. Keep the whole child in view.
    Even when we focus on specific issues, we recognize that children’s lives are interconnected.

What This Means For Our Work

At any given time, you may see us concentrating on specific policy areas or initiatives. That focus reflects what the data tell us children need most right now — not a narrowing of our mission.