Census tracks 'child's day'

Utah's numbers are hard to pin down. The State Office of Education reports that 24,400 high school students were in at least one concurrent enrollment class, which extends college credit to teenagers, in the 2003-04 school year, the State Office of Education reports. That's 19.8 percent of high schoolers.

In the same year, nearly 13,400 students, or about 9 percent of the population, were enrolled in Advanced Placement, which also offers college credit.

Schools also offer gifted programs, honors classes and International Baccalaureate programs that would be considered advanced, but the State Office of Education does not track those numbers.

For the under-high-school set, Jordan School District, the state's largest with about 80,000 students, reports 1,219 elementary school students in its Accelerated Learning Program for Students (ALPS), offered at seven schools, plus 383 ALPS middle school students. But ALPS is a drop in the bucket really, says program coordinator Jodi Stewart-Browning. Gifted programs on top of these are offered at individual schools.

Other tidbits:

• 67 percent of preschoolers had TV restrictions. Children with no TV rules were read to less than those with them.

• 42 percent of middle- and high-school-age students participated in sports, and about a third participated in club activities. Those from two-parent homes of higher economic and educational status were more likely to take part.

• 69 percent of children in poverty were reported to be academically on track, versus 78 percent of the more well-off.

• 24 percent of teens ate breakfast with a parent every day in a typical week.

• 30 million children participated in the National School Lunch Program.

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E-mail: jtcook@desnews.com