Federal poverty threshold different

Politifact

lower student enrollment, 33,812, compared to 157,143 students shown for the Dallas district.

Food Research and Action Center researcher Madeleine Levin told us the discrepancies may reflect the fact that the federal counts drew on figures dating to October 2010 while the center drew on responses from food service departments submitted in fall 2011. At any rate, Levin said, both data sources indicate a high level of poverty among students in the Dallas schools.

Next, we looked for a more precise breakdown of children living in — not just above — poverty.

Census spokesman Robert Bernstein helped us compare child poverty, based on tax filings and other records, within the Dallas school district to child poverty in the six other districts. About 47 percent of children in the Detroit district lived at or