Protecting Undocumented Children from Abuse and Neglect

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There's some new research about how to better protect undocumented children in the child welfare system. It comes out of Texas where less than one percent of children in state care last year were undocumented, according to the Annie E. Casey Foundation’s report called Undocumented and Abused. Eighty-five percent of those children were Hispanic. The report maintains that a blanket policy to send them all home is not the answer. It goes on to explain in detail how a child can get special immigrant juvenile status (SIJS).

New Interactive Mapping Tool Shows Who Your Neighbors Are

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If you’re looking for something to think about over the holidays, this could be it. The New York Times has used Census Bureau data to map out the distribution of racial and ethnic groups across the country. You can literally put in your zip code and see the breakdown in your town. You can even scroll your mouse over different areas to see detailed percentages. This could be useful to schools, police departments, juvenile courts and those who may be interested in the disproportionate minority contact problem facing the nation.

Kids Join Gangs for Protection, Respect & Friends, Report Says

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There's some new nationwide research on why kids are involved in gangs and how to stop them from joining up. The Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention released its December 2010 report called Gang Prevention: An Overview of Research and Programs.

The report highlights why kids join gangs and how communities can best combat gang activity. The OJJDP found that not all strategies work. But, here are a few that do:

Parent and family involvement
Training teachers and parents to manage unruly young people
Providing education that teaches kids interpersonal skills

For some insight on how to rescue a teenager from a gang, check out the column from Sedgrid Lewis in Ideas and Opinions at JJIE.org.

TV Shows Sexualize Images of Teenage Girls, Study Says

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Television shows are featuring teenage girls involved in sexual situations a lot more often than adult women.  

Out of the sexual incidents young girls were portrayed in, 98 percent of them occurred outside of a committed relationship and 73 percent were presented in a humorous manner, such as a punch line to a joke. This data comes from a study conducted by the Parents Television Council. The study, called Sexualized Teen Girls: Tinseltown’s New Target, looked at the top 25 primetime shows aimed at teenagers in the 2009-2010 season. The study targets popular shows such as Glee, Gossip Girl and 90210.

The Glee Effect: Singing Teens Do Better in School

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Students are finding musical inspiration from shows like “Glee” and “The Sing-Off” and studies show that singing kids do better in school and are more diverse. Ninety percent of educators believe singing in a choir can keep some students engaged who might otherwise be lost, according a nationwide study. The Atlanta Journal Constitution profiled Marist High School in Atlanta, which has caught “The Glee Effect” where stereotypes are being broken. A variety of students, from teens who play sports to more reserved teens, are participating in school choirs. Thirty-one percent of kids between 8 and 18 say that movies like Disney’s “Camp Rock” and shows like “Glee” make them want to get involved in music making, according to a recent poll conducted by Harris Interactive.

LGBT Teens Are More Likely to Get Arrested

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Teens who are lesbian, gay or bisexual are more likely to be arrested, expelled from school and/or put in jail than heterosexual kids, according to a nationwide study. The study also found that gay kids are more vulnerable to health risks including addiction, bullying and family abuse. The National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health looked at teens in grades seven through 12 who identified themselves as lesbian, gay or bisexual. Lesbian girls reported the worst treatment, indicating they were stopped by police 50 percent more often than their straight peers in one experiment. The study, published in the journal Pediatrics, is unclear why lesbian, gay or bisexual kids are facing harsher treatment.

National Study Says Teens Are Smoking More Pot

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The number of pot smoking teens increased this year with one third of high school seniors admitting they used marijuana during the month before participating in a national survey. And it’s not just seniors. One in seven 8th graders and one in four 10th graders are also smoking pot. This data comes from the 2010 National Institute on Drug Abuse Monitoring the Future study, which has been surveying American teens since 1975. The study, designed and conducted by the University of Michigan, looked at more than 46,000 8th, 10th and 12th graders enrolled in over 350 public and private schools.

Survey Finds Physical Bullying Far More Common Than Online Bullying

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Kids are more likely to face a bully in person than online.   The 2009 OJJDP National Survey of Children’s Exposure to Violence surveyed almost 4,450 kids nationwide, between the ages of 10 and 17.  Here are some highlights:

21.6% said they had been physically bullied. 19.7% reported being teased or emotionally bullied. Kids between the 14 and 17 were more likely to be harassed online.  7.9% of this group admitted being bullied online. Boys were more likely to be bullied or threatened physically, where girls were more likely to be victims of internet harassment.

Southern States Lead the Way in Reducing National Dropout Rate

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More freshmen teens in Georgia and other southern states are going on to graduate, which has helped improve the national dropout average. The number of “dropout factories” – high schools where less than 60 percent of freshman actually graduate – went down from 2,007 to 1,746 between 2002 and 2008, according to a Johns Hopkins report out today called Building a Grad Nation: Progress and Challenge in Ending the High School Dropout Epidemic. Here’s the picture in Georgia. In 2002, 156 high schools were considered dropout factories. Things improved in 2008 with the number dropping to 120 schools.

Why Kids End Up In Jail And What They Have In Common

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About 20 percent of kids in jail are there because of a violent crime and about 69 percent of those kids say they knew their victims. In addition, 44 percent of incarcerated youth were under the influence of alcohol or drugs when committing an offense and about 55 percent committed their current offense with someone else. This information comes from the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention, which released its latest bulletin called Youth Characteristics and Backgrounds that focuses on the characteristics of young people in jail to better understand the reasons why they’ve offended. The Office looked extensively at jailed kids between 10 and 20 years old. Here are some other fascinating facts:

Although boys on average commit more serious offenses like murder, rape, kidnapping and robbery, girls have been arrested more than boys in the past decade. The majority of kids locked up (51 percent) are 16 or 17 years old.