Poor Kids is a 2012 episode of the PBS series Frontline. It explores the lives of children in three families who live in poverty in the Quad Cities area of the United States. It was directed by Jezza Neumann.^[1]

In 2012, in the aftermath of the 2008 recession, one in five children in the United States lived in poverty and 1 in 45 were homeless,^[1] with the child-poverty rate at a historic high of 18.1%.^[2] The Quad Cities, made up of the Mississippi River cities in the U.S. states of Iowa and Illinois: Davenport and Bettendorf in southeastern Iowa, and Rock Island, Moline, and East Moline in northwestern Illinois, historically a major hub for farm equipment manufacturing, have suffered from deindustrialization for decades.^[3]

The film team, led by Jezza Neumann, the director and producer, and Lauren Mucciolo, a producer, began filming in 2011.^[4]

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Ellen Druda, writing for Library Journal, described the film as "an intimate and often moving picture of American children struggling with poverty. Honest, direct, and enlightening, this film belongs in public and academic libraries, especially those with comprehensive sociology collections."^[6]

Elizabeth Jahn, writing for the Children's Legal Rights Journal, wrote that the film gives an intimate look at the reality of child poverty in the United States, showing the "common struggles that poor children face in a way that is candid and personal." The hope the children have shows that growing up poor should not hold them back from a better future, as all children have great potential and "with time, hope, and motivation, children who grow up in poverty can break the poverty cycle."^[7]

David Hinckley of the New York Daily News wrote approvingly, stating that it "doesn't sermonize" but "lets the children talk" showing that while their situation is difficult, they "haven't lost all their dreams. But they’re haunted, by poverty, in ways no kid should have to be."^[8]

The film was nominated for a News & Documentary Emmy for "Outstanding Continuing Coverage of a News Story – Long Form".^[9] It won the Robert F. Kennedy Journalism Award of the Robert F. Kennedy Center for Justice and Human Rights for Domestic Television.^[10][11]

In 2017, an updated version of the film was released to document where the children were five years later.^[12]

In 2025, a third installment in the series, a full-length documentary titled Born Poor was released. It follows Brittany, Johnny, and Kayli, all now with kids of their own, as they enter adulthood.^[13][14][15]

Robert Lloyd, writing for the LA Times, described the series as similar to the 7 Up films of Michael Apted, offering a genuinely real program in a television landscape "glutted with 'reality'".^[13]

Poor Kids at IMDb