Chapin Hall

Illinois Law Taps Chapin Hall to Develop Children’s Adversity Index, Offering Blueprint for Other States

Chapin Hall was designated in Illinois HB0342 as the expert partner organization tasked with developing a Children’s Adversity Index—a statewide tool designed to better understand and address the conditions that contribute to childhood trauma within communities, as defined by school district boundaries. This groundbreaking index that was launched earlier this month advances Illinois’ whole-child approach by using comprehensive, publicly available data to spotlight key community-level risk factors including food insecurity, housing burden, child abuse investigations, and overdose deaths. The methodology is highly adaptable, offering a replicable model for other states and jurisdictions.

“It’s a very complex project and there were a lot of things I feel very few organizations can do, in large part because not a lot of organizations have the connections we do along with the technical know-how,” said Chapin Hall Policy Fellow Dr. Kiljoong Kim, the principal investigator for the ISBE CAI. “We also had to put together a steering committee to get feedback from external partners and, since our own Dr. Dana Weiner is leading the Illinois Children’s Behavioral Health Transformation Initiative, we were able to pull in a lot of different state agencies and local advocacy groups for that committee.”

Chapin Hall spearheaded the technical development of the Children’s Adversity Index in collaboration with the Illinois State Board of Education (ISBE) and Civic Consulting Alliance, drawing on the expertise of leading professionals in child development, trauma, and public policy. Grounded in the Pair of ACEs framework—which highlights the connection between Adverse Childhood Experiences and Adverse Community Environments—the project reflects a deeply informed, evidence-based approach. The foundation of the index was developed by Chapin Hall Senior Policy Analyst Dr. Holly White-Wolfe, an ACEs Interface Master Trainer, who created a similar tool during her PhD research in Justice Studies.

“We can see that resources are not evenly distributed across places, and there is a clear connection between place, race, and wellbeing,” White-Wolfe said about developing an effective index. “My goal was to highlight the broader context contributing to childhood adversity and move away from parent-blaming narratives that overlook the environments in which parents raise their children. With an index, we can measure these disparities—moving beyond anecdotal discussions because we now have the numbers. Communities can begin to engage with this data, asking: If we want all families to thrive, and yet see that conditions are unequal, what steps can we take to change that?”

The Chapin Hall-built Children’s Adversity Index organizes data into three domains:

• Community Risk Trajectories – indicators like child abuse and neglect investigations, juvenile delinquency, overdose deaths, and uninsured youth

• Community Unmet Needs – measures including food insecurity, adult mental distress, vacant housing, and imprisonment rates

• Barriers to Economic Progress – factors such as housing cost burden, educational attainment, health insurance coverage, median income, and unemployment

Interactive maps allow users to compare individual communities to statewide averages and view detailed local profiles. By mapping where adversity is most concentrated across Illinois communities, the index gives decision-makers, grantmakers, and service providers an evidence-based foundation for targeting funding and resources to the communities with the greatest needs, aligning services and programming with local conditions, and informing cross-sector collaboration to address systemic barriers. Aligning with Chapin Hall’s commitment to racial equity, the index delivers on a key recommendation from the state’s 2022 Whole Child Task Force Report, fulfilling a 2023 legislative mandate to develop data that supports more effective, equitable policy. Chapin Hall will also lead the index update next year.

“Everyone had distinct but really important roles on the team and every team member was critical to the success of the index,” Kim said. Chapin Hall Researchers Sam Shapiro and Cody Oltmans and Chapin Hall Policy Analyst Madeline Youngren were pivotal to the data analysis and project management. Senior Policy Mike Stiehl provided invaluable expertise about methodologies for aggregating, displaying, and interpreting spatial data.

This initiative serves as a model for states seeking to better understand and respond to childhood adversity within their own communities. With deep expertise in research and systems-level solutions, Chapin Hall is uniquely equipped to help other states adapt this work. The strategies, methodologies, and tools developed for Illinois can be tailored to local data and conditions—enabling states to pinpoint disparities, allocate resources strategically, and strengthen cross-sector collaboration to drive meaningful impact.