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A Couple Fights to Stay a Family
A New Jersey couple is engaged in a constant battle to prove their fitness as parents. They lost custody of their son for 18 months when child welfare authorities put him in foster care. They are among thousands of parents around the country with mental limitations who face the same struggle. Nationwide, 40 to 60 percent of parents with mental limitations will have a child taken away by the child protection system, at least temporarily. Deciding whether a child is safe at home, or needs to be placed in foster care, is a tough decision. When mentally disabled parents are involved, the decision is even tougher. ++++++++++ Charting Parenthood: A Statistical Portrait of Fathers and Mothers in America
Just in time for Fathers' Day: More fathers than mothers believe that two parents are more effective at raising children than one parent alone. Forty-five percent of mothers believe one parent is sufficient. Twenty-five percent of fathers hold that belief. Most fathers who live with their children participate regularly in some kind of leisure activity with them. More than one in five preschool children in two parent families have their father as the primary caregiver when the mother is at work, attending school, or looking for work. Father involvement has been found to be a more important predictor than a mother’s involvement in the likelihood of a child getting better grades.
.++++++++++ Can Fathering Be Taught?
This lengthy article asks several questions about government-sponsored programs that encourage fathers to be financially and emotionally invested in their children’s lives and looks specifically at those programs in New York. ++++++++++ New Parental Responsibility Ordinance
In Maple Heights, a suburb of Cleveland, parents could face misdemeanor convictions and pay up to $3,000 in restitution if their children are changed with a crime. The new ordinance was adopted this month in response to frequent complaints of disruptive teens congregating, violating curfew, or vandalizing.
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A Guide to Online Resources in Family Involvement
This Harvard Family Research Project has compiled and categorized a large body of information to make it easier to access and use. The guide includes sections on standards, programs, tools and special initiatives and is available online as a BIG pdf file.
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Parental Alcoholism Creates Risk Factors for Young Adult Children
A new study identifies parental alcoholism as an important risk factor for escalated use of both alcohol and other drugs during young adulthood. It is specifically associated with both an early onset of drinking and with persistent alcohol abuse throughout adulthood. Currently 1 in 4 children (under the age of 18) grow up in a household affected by alcoholism according to the National Association of Children of Alcoholics. This means 1 in 4 emerging adults and young adults will be faced with an increased risk for alcoholism and illicit drug use, simply because of exposure to an alcoholic parent.
++++++++++ Programs for Young Mothers Nurse-Family Partnership
This is a national nonprofit program designed to improve the health and lives of low-income, first-time moms and their kids. It has been scientifically shown to work in rigorous long-term studies that find it not only helps young mother with parenting skills, but a also reduces child abuse, welfare use, arrest and substance abuse, while improving education and employment rates. Children are less likely to have serious behavior problems. It serves more than 20,000 families in 20 states. Portland Insights
This article interviews a young mother who leads a youth council at Portland Insights, one of the few nonprofit agencies in the United States that is devoted exclusively to the needs of teen parents. Insights works with 1,500 young parents and their children every year. Programs include parenting groups, housing assistance and homeless teen parent support. ++++++++++ Township Directory
The directory gives the names of parents of rural Southington Township in Ohio who have signed up and promise they will not make unsafe things available at any parties being held in their homes. If a parent is listed in the directory, the parent agrees to keep children safe from alcohol, drugs, firearms, tobacco and violent video games and videos. ++++++++++ Annie E. Casey Foundation 2006 FAMILIES COUNT Honorees Three organizations are being honored by the Casey Foundation for their work to improve the odds for vulnerable children by helping them have strong, capable and economically successful families. Each of the award winners has received an award of $500,000. Atlantic Street Center helps low-income families strengthen their roles as parents, wage earners and engaged community members through a wealth of programs and services, ranging from parents support groups and child care to citizenship classes for immigrant and refugee families. Grandparents and Kinship Care in Action is a support group for caregivers raising the children of relatives.
Georgia Justice Project couples pro bono legal counsel with social services and even jobs in its landscaping company to help clients put their lives and their families on the right track for the long term. As a result of this holistic approach, GJP's recidivism rate is one-third the national average.
Grace Hill Settlement House lives by the credo, “neighbors helping neighbors” to strengthen families and communities. Its innovative Member Organized Resource Exchange (MORE engages community members in designing courses for their own Neighborhood College and in operating a time-dollar exchange. Families can use "time dollars" to barter for other services, purchase health care at a Grace Hill Health Center or redeem for household items at a MORE store.
More information on all three organizations at the link above.
++++++++++ Parental Guilt and Kids with Special Needs A brief article by a Canadian social worker on the psychological and emotional adjustment parents must make as they adapt to the realization that their child’s development will not follow the normal developmental curve and will require special services to adapt and overcome. Readers are welcome to print the article or use it in a newsletter. ++++++++++ Taking a Closer Look: A Guide to Online Resources on Family Involvement The Harvard Family Research Project has compiled and categorized the large body of information and resources available online on Family Involvement. The downloadable guide contains annotated web links to recent research, information, and tools about family involvement. While primarily education oriented, the information in the guide is applicable in a variety of settings. 49 page pdf file.
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Regional Data on Marriage and Births A new Census Bureau analysis of marriage, fertility and socioeconomic characteristics examines this data by state. People in the Northeast marry later and are more likely to live together without marriage and less likely to become teenage mothers than are people in the South. Generally, states in the Northeast and the West had a higher percentage of unmarried-partner households than those in the South. The percentage of births to unmarried mothers was highest in the South. Noncitizens make up a third of the new mothers in California, and more than 20% in Arizona, Nevada and Texas.
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Fathers Are Encouraged to Become Involved in Children’s Education Schools in some 80 cities around the country and in Auckland, New Zealand, are participating in the Million Father March this year. It calls on men to walk children to school on the first day or to participate in school events. In the U.S, about one-third of all children live apart from their biological fathers. Studies have shown that when fathers stay involved students are less likely to repeat a grade, drop out, or develop problems such as substance abuse. ++++++++++ Marriage and Child Well-being
The latest issue of the Future of Children Journal, you can download the entire issue or a two page executive summary. Mounting social science evidence about changes in marriage and childbearing during the latter part of the twentieth century shows these changes are not in the best interests of children. From the report: In 1970, 12% of families with children were headed by a single parent. By 2003 that figure had doubled, to 26%. Roughly half of all children born today are expected to live apart from a parent before they reach 18. The decline in two-parent families since 1960 has been closely linked with a rise in child poverty, primarily because poverty rates are far higher in single-mother families than in two-parent families. The post-1960 changes in marriage and family formation also appear to be depriving children of such documented benefits of marriage as better physical and emotional health and greater socioeconomic attainment.
++++++++++ Engaging and Retaining Participants in Voluntary New Parent Support Programs This Chapin Hall issue brief looks at the reasons why parents fail to participate voluntarily in therapeutic or supportive services. ++++++++++ For Better or Worse
I generally avoid opinion pieces in Brevity, but this one on the state of contemporary marriage by a family history teacher and author of a history of marriage struck me as particularly thoughtful and informative. ++++++++++ |
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