Methodology
How this report was built: the years it covers, where the numbers come from, the rule we use to decide whether a data point is reliable enough to publish, and — importantly — why some points are missing from the charts.
Scope & Years
This report tracks youth wellbeing in San Diego from 2005 to 2023 for residents aged 0 to 24. The exact span shown for any single metric depends on its underlying survey. The Youth Risk Behavior Survey, for example, runs on a two-year cycle, so its charts show every other year rather than every year. Self-sufficiency wage standards are only published for 2000, 2003, 2008, 2011, 2014, 2018, 2021, and 2024; because a reduced set of family sizes was available before 2008, we use 2008 onward and adjust intervening years for inflation using the San Diego Consumer Price Index.
Definitions of “youth” and “young adult” vary across studies and data sources, so the age range shown for a given metric reflects the source that produced it.
Breakdowns by Identity
Where the data allow, we break results down by race, sex, immigrant status, disability status, sexual orientation, and age. These breakdowns show how identity shapes experience and where targeted resources might help most. When a source does not collect a particular characteristic, that breakdown is simply unavailable for that metric.
The Inclusion Rule
We do not report any group with an effective sample size below 30. We apply this rule for two reasons: to protect the anonymity of survey participants, and to keep estimates reliable. A sample of about 30 is the minimum that approximates a normal distribution; smaller samples tend to produce biased or unrepresentative estimates.
The word “effective” matters for weighted surveys. The effective sample size is the size of a simple random sample that would give the same precision as the weighted data. Setting the threshold on the effective size — rather than the raw count — keeps precision consistent across different sampling methods. When a subgroup falls below this threshold, its point is withheld rather than shown.
Why Some Points Are Missing
Gaps in the charts are deliberate, not errors. A point can be absent for any of these reasons:
- The survey was not run that year. Not every survey is conducted annually. The Youth Risk Behavior Survey is biennial, so odd- and even-year coverage differs by metric.
- 2020 is excluded. We do not report 2020 data because of pandemic-related data-quality problems, including disruptions to the American Community Survey. Standardized tests (Smarter Balanced) were also not administered in the 2019–20 school year.
- Too few respondents. When a group’s effective sample size falls below 30 (see the inclusion rule above), we withhold the estimate rather than publish an unreliable number.
- The source did not collect it. Some breakdowns or years simply were not gathered by the underlying survey.
So when a line breaks or a bar is absent, it usually means the data either were not collected, came from too small a sample to trust, or fell in a year we exclude.
Data Sources
To give a well-rounded picture, we drew on several sources. Details follow.
| Source | What we used it for |
|---|---|
| US Census Bureau — American Community Survey (ACS), via IPUMS USA | Original analysis of ACS microdata for the San Diego population and youth, preschool enrollment, high school completion, college enrollment and completion, housing stability, family-sustaining wages, labor force participation, employment, working while in school, self-sufficient wages, and health insurance. Wage measures combine ACS data with self-sufficiency standards from the Center for Women’s Welfare (University of Washington). |
| California Department of Education — DataQuest and research files | Youth by disability status, standardized test scores (Smarter Balanced), multiple-language fluency (Summative ELPAC), and student homelessness. |
| US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention — Youth Risk Behavior Survey (YRBS), analyzed for SDUSD, California, and US high schoolers | Most physical and mental health metrics (except health insurance and low birth weight), all victimization metrics, and all risky-behavior metrics (except juvenile arrests). Because San Diego YRBS data come from one public school district, results may not generalize to homeschooled, private-school, or other-district students. |
| The Urban Institute — Upward Mobility Data Dashboard | Preschool enrollment and high school completion in the City of San Diego, and school economic diversity in the City and County. |
| County of San Diego — Health & Human Services Agency, Maternal, Child, and Family Health Services | Low birth weight (Table 20). |
| Federal Bureau of Investigation — National Incident-Based Reporting System (NIBRS) | Juvenile arrests across San Diego County. |
For full citations and figure-by-figure notes, see the comprehensive report’s Appendix II: Methodology.