This booklet provides a general review of the work of the Public Schools Athletic League and discusses the Athletic Badge Test, a test given to boys requiring them to run a certain distance,  jump a certain distance, and pull themselves up to a bar a certain number of times.

This booklet, reprinted from Proceedings of the Second Annual Playground Congress, discusses what the New York City Board of Education has done to provide facilities for children’s play outside school hours, what additional facilities for recreation might be provided, and some suggestions for the administration of children’s recreation.

WILLIAM H. MAXWELL was the superintendent of schools, New York City.

A form listing people and places—including churches, employers, medical agencies, and public officials—that social agencies might have visited with columns for noting the number of visits to each. An explanation following the list notes that agencies using the largest number of outside sources of information will be seen as having made the best investigation into the cases they are treating.

"Conservatives in other countries have long supported universal child benefits as an important tool for tackling child poverty while encouraging work and family stability. American conservatives have been more skeptical, but, as Jane Waldfogel demonstrates with wide-ranging evidence, child benefits are one pro-family policy that deserves support across the political spectrum."
-JOSH McCABE, director of social policy, Niskanen Center

"In this well-researched and informative book, Jane Waldfogel examines the case for child benefits in the United States. Woven with evidence and history, and tackling head-on the trade-offs embedded in the policy debate, Child Benefits is exactly what we need for this moment."
-HILARY HOYNES, Chancellor's Professor of Economics and Public Policy, Goldman School of Public Policy, University of California, Berkeley

"If you're interested in child poverty and in issues and challenges that government benefits and programs for children now face, do not miss Child Benefits. It is full of keen insights, thoughtful and deeply informative discussions, and wisdom about where we as a nation should go from here. And it's written in a clear, nontechnical, and highly readable manner that should appeal to a broad audience, which the book very much deserves."
-ROBERT GREENSTEIN, visiting fellow in economic studies, The Brookings Institution, and founder and president emeritus, Center on Budget and Policy Priorities

The United States has one of the highest child poverty rates among wealthy countries and stands out among its peers as the only country that does not offer a child benefit – regular payments from the government to most or all families with children, not conditioned on parental employment. During the temporary expansion of the Child Tax Credit (CTC) in 2021, the CTC functioned as a child benefit, and the child poverty rate fell to the lowest level ever recorded in the United States. Despite this decrease, the CTC expansion was not renewed. Concerns about enacting a child benefit include the cost, the possibility of misuse of money by parents, and how it might affect parental employment and fertility. In Child Benefits, social policy scholar Jane Waldfogel details the history and origins of child benefits around the world and comprehensively assesses how child benefits affect family spending, fertility, employment, child poverty, and child wellbeing to address such concerns and to determine the benefits of enacting such a policy permanently.

Drawing on research from peer countries in the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development as well as the United States, Waldfogel shows that a child benefit would prevent poverty and hardship and protect children from deep poverty and income instability. The research is clear that families would spend the money from a child benefit on food, clothing, and other items for their children and that a child benefit would not have large negative impacts on parental employment or family decisions about fertility. It also shows that a child benefit would promote short- and longer-term child and family wellbeing. Child benefits have been shown to enhance opportunity and benefit society through healthier and better-educated young adults and stronger and more stable families. And rigorous benefit-cost analyses indicate that a child benefit, while costly, would more than pay for itself, yielding a large return on investment.

Waldfogel evaluates four current, major proposals for a child benefit and provides recommendations for a policy that would deliver the best outcomes for children and families and the best return on investment. She argues that such a policy would be more generous, not tied to parental employment or earnings, available to all parents but phased out for higher-income families, delivered in monthly payments through the tax system, and provided in addition to existing social programs.

Child Benefits provides fascinating insights on the history and impacts of child benefits and makes a clear and definitive argument for the establishment of a child benefit in the United States.

This booklet discusses what 1,038 U.S. cities are doing for the health of school children. The first part discusses medical inspection, including the history of medical inspection, administration, and kinds of medical inspection. The second part covers hygiene of the school room, including outdoor recesses, individual drinking cups and sanitary fountains, modern methods of dusting and sweeping, and instruction in alcohol, tobacco, tuberculosis, and first aid.

This booklet presents the result of a study of play for children in institutions presented in a series of five conferences at the invitation of the State Board of Charities of New York. It discusses the function and value of play as well as requisites for play and the adaptation of play for various age groups.

ROBERT K. ATKINSON was a researcher who studied children’s institutions in the United States.

This booklet discusses schools in the North and Lowland South known as “mountain mission schools” as distinguished from public schools and from well-endowed private schools. After describing the character of these schools, it describes how these schools can have a positive impact on generations of people in the region.

JOHN C. CAMPBELL was the secretary of the Southern Highland Division of the Russell Sage Foundation.

This article from The Psychological Clinic, reprinted as an RSF booklet the same year, attempts to examine possible relations between physical disability and school progress in children.

LEONARD P. AYRES was director of the Division of Education at the Russell Sage Foundation.

This booklet provides a list of courses for training leaders of recreation programs. It includes courses offered by universities, colleges, and state normal schools; courses offered by schools of physical education and other training schools; courses offered by national organizations for training leaders in their activities; courses offered by local agencies for training leaders; and other special courses.

MARGUERITA P. WILLIAMS worked in the Department of Recreation at the Russell Sage Foundation.

LEE F. HANMER was associate director of the Department of Child Hygiene at the Russell Sage Foundation.