Dear Lord be good to me. The sea is so wide and my boat is so small

The Children's Defense Fund Leave No Child Behind® mission is to ensure every child a Healthy Start, a Head Start, a Fair Start, a Safe Start and a Moral Start in life and successful passage to adulthood with the help of caring families and communities. Full Mission Statement »

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    Tomorrow begins today. Help us now »

  • Beat the Odds® Program

    CDF's Beat the Odds program celebrates and rewards the achievements of extraordinary youths. Read more »

  • Be Careful What You Cut

    Cutting Texas children from the budget now will cost us all later. Learn more and get involved »

  • Portrait of Inequality

    This new resource illustrates how Hispanic children and youth are being pushed deeper and deeper into an abyss of poverty and despair. Learn more »

Protect Children, Not Guns

For more than 20 years, CDF has produced a gun report "Protect Children, Not Guns" which documents the epidemic of gun violence in America. A child or teen dies or is injured from guns every 30 minutes. Gun violence saturates our children’s lives. More children and teens die from guns every three days than died in the Newtown massacre. The number of children under 5 killed by guns in 2010 was more than the number of law enforcement officers killed in the line of duty that same year. Between 1979 and 2010, 119,079 children and teens died from guns. This is more deaths in 32 years than U.S. soldiers killed in action in the Vietnam, Korean, Afghanistan and Iraq wars combined.

Download and share the proposed common sense gun safety laws in CDF’s federal policy agenda that would help keep guns out of the hands of children and those who would use guns against children. Distribute the most up-to-date key facts on child and teen gun deaths and injuries and take action by signing a petition to the President and members of Congress demanding they #ProtectChildrenNotGuns.

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CDF-TX News

Zerwas Proposes Alternative to Medicaid Expansion
April 17, 2013, Texas Tribune

Uninsured residents in Texas counties
April 17, 2013, Houston Chronicle

Kerrville semniar on healthcare slated
March 26, 2013, San Antonio Express News

Experts Say Texas Needs Healthcare Reform
March 6, 2013, New America Media interviews CDF's Laura Guerra-Cardus

read more news

About CDF

Learn more about CDF, our history and our Leave No Child Behind® mission.

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Erica Limón: CDF-California Beat the Odds® Honoree

Erica overcame abuse and homelessness and will soon graduate high school, start boot camp with the Marines in June, and plans to begin college in a year or two. If Harvard's lucky, they might get her.
More profiles of CDF’s Young Adult Leaders »

 

Full-Day Kindergarten

Arm yourself with the latest information on the status of Full-Day K in Texas
Download your state-specific fact sheet »

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