Putnam County Family Connection (PCFC) met for the first time this year on Jan. 17 at The Plaza Arts Center, where its annual review of county data about children, families, and the community’s wellbeing was presented.
Those in attendance represented the healthcare sector, local education system, non-profits and churches, and other interested and involved community members, each of whom played a crucial role in discussing the statistics presented.
Georgia Family Connection Partnership (GaFCP) Regional Manager Adam Swymer opened with introductions before diving into the meeting’s activity. Those in attendance were asked a series of multiple-choice or true-false questions about Putnam County data and asked to stand up to vote on which answer they believed to be true.
These questions pertained to data that would later be presented and discussed in the meeting, such as school attendance, the graduation rate in the county compared to the state of Georgia, and Georgia’s 2023 Kids Count national ranking for Child and Family Well-being.
Some members were alarmed at the answers, bringing attention to the importance of analyzing data, because it represents issues in the community to be addressed. On the other hand, some data trivia questions brought positive change to light as well.
Following the activity, the previous meeting’s minutes were approved and GaFCP evaluation consultant Kirk O’Brien was introduced.
“As a collaborative, when we think about the role that we play to impact outcomes in the community, it is how we work together and how we implement activities, programs, and services that move the needle on outcomes we select,” O’Brien said.
County indicators were compared to the state of Georgia as a whole, ranking Putnam County as similar, better, or worse. Since data for Georgia is considerably larger than for Putnam County, the state’s statistics remained more consistent, plus the interruption of COVID also affected the response rate, attitudes, and other indicators.
The meeting focused primarily on two reports representing the county profile and its birth-to-21 snapshot. These reports contained many indicators, with statistics largely focused on risky teen behavior as the collaborative’s primary goal remains to help assist families with children.
“Something we should engage in is working with schools to see if there is a way to encourage students to take the Georgia Student Health Survey,” O’Brien suggested. Lower response rates provide less accurate data, so to get this important information concerning topics like mental health, action must be taken, he stressed.
This ties into the Collaborative’s ongoing concern about underage drinking and youth perceptions of alcohol. The first indicator discussed was the rate of 9th-grade students reporting a perception of negative risk with alcohol consumption. Putnam had a rate of 66.7% while Georgia had a rate of 76.8% in 2020.
“What we do know, especially coming out of COVID, mental health in kids is becoming more and more of a challenge. Ask questions around alcohol risk, but also ask questions about depression and anxiety,” O’Brien urged. “The only tool we have at our disposal, unless we implement something locally, is the Georgia Student Health Survey. But this data will start to fall off these reports because the last year we have confident results in is 2022.”
The drop in participation comes from it not being a mandatory requirement for students to take the survey. Therefore, some data analyzed during this meeting came from 2022 or earlier.
The next indicator analyzed was STD incidence in youth aged 15 to 19 years old. Putnam had a higher incidence rate, at 42.2 per thousand, compared to 33.4 per thousand statewide in 2022. However, it should be noted, that this age range is quite broad, so statistics for 18-to-19-year-olds were discussed separately, as older ages tend to skew the numbers upward.
Lastly, school attendance rates were analyzed, with specific attention paid to students absent from more than 15 days of school. In 2022, Putnam had a 20.2% overall rate, compared to a 24.4% rate for Georgia overall.
Members of the collaborative later broke into small groups to further discuss the data presented. They were asked to talk about what may influence these trends, what implications they might have for Putnam and FY25 planning, specifically, and if other data is still needed.
Groups raised questions about teaching students about specific health-related topics, including sexual safety and alcohol usage. Ideas to promote incentives for students’ attendance also were discussed.
At the day’s end, some attendees expressed shock at some of the data presented and discussed but said they were glad to be made aware of some issues Putnam’s youth may, unfortunately, face and struggle with.
The next meeting for the Putnam Family Connection Collaborative is Feb. 22 and more information is available online at putnam.gafcp.org.