Abstract:
Juvenile Delinquency is a complicated subject because researchers and scholars have tried different methods to reduce it. Research shows that the methods which have had better results are those that are implemented in a way where the family of the juveniles gets involved in the process (Laub, 2014). A policy that will be advocated is the policy in the city of Santa Ana, CA: The Santa Ana Police Athletic and Academic League (SAPAAL). If we want to reduce delinquency and crime then we should focus on prevention rather than intervention. There is not one theory that explains why people commit crime, on the contrary, there are multiple well-known theories that argue for different explanations of delinquency. As learned through lectures
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I had the opportunity to talk with the officer in charge and saw that they do believe their program influences their participants. Kenny believes that in order to reduce delinquency and crime one should focus prevention because it works better than intervention. They work to build a bond between the kids and the police; by doing so they gain the trust of the youth and also that of their parents and the community. The SAPAAL is part of a chapter of PAAL programs that exist around the country, and they work with the belief that “it’s better to build youth than to mend adults (NPAL, …show more content…
A youth with many risk factors is at double the chances of failure but by accepting him into the program will open up more options and they give them hope; that which is one of the key factors that will separate them from the others that do end up being part of the age distribution table for crime and delinquency. Hope is a very powerful tool, it gives them the light they need to become committed to their education, to become an active member of conventional institutions and to develop those bonds that will keep them from becoming
Parents should be more involved with their children’s lives, and try to discipline and set rules at an early age. It is better for a juvenile to be confined rather than him/her influencing average teenagers to follow in his footsteps. It is a sad day when a teenager has to spend his/her days in a juvenile facility rather than outside enjoying his freedom and childhood. Children, who attend these programs and cannot cope with the challenges, can be easily abused. The risk in enrolling these teenagers into such disciplinary programs may either break them or make them improve their behaviors and quality of life. Teenagers who come out of these camps are stronger, disciplined, educated and even become role models to other teens can someday help other delinquents. In order to change someone’s life, one must first change his/her actions and
The reason for this program is to use innovative approaches in developing programs, which will teach youth alternatives to violence, substance abuse, anger issues, low self-esteem, and the consequences as a result of making bad choices. During, the program non-violence, team building, leadership development and communication skills is promoted. A neutral and positive setting is provided for young people, so they are able to come together from different gangs throughout the city to work on their issues and programs together. When a youth is referred to the program they have an Intake-Assessment with the family. “Together, a Program Contract/Service Plan will be developed based on the individual needs of the youth/family. If the youth is on probation/parole all requirements of the courts will be incorporated into their contract. Services offered are case management, mediation, innovative focus groups, presentations, collaboration with other youth service organizations, and attendance at court hearings” (Stop ABQ Gangs,
In comparing results of today’s Scared Straight programs with those of the pilot program, there seems to be a large gap in the rate of recidivism, perhaps due to changes in culture or because of the pressure from being televised in the pilot program. Also, a great flaw in Multisystemic Therapy is the high price, which often out of reach for lower income families, and requires a great deal of time and commitment, making it less appealing than the quick-fix offered by Scared Straight. Research would suggest that Scared Straight style program is flawed in that it does not take into account the way a child sees an incarcerated adult, and in that it increases recidivism rather than decreases it. However, parents of children who have participated in M.A.C.E. have praised the program, and claimed that it changed the attitude and behavior of their child. Parents of children who have participated in Multisystemic Therapy have made similar claims, stating that there has been an improved overall attitude in their child. The effectiveness of MST versus Scared Straight is difficult to gauge, as parents have similar positive things to say about their preferred program, and both have their drawbacks, Scared Straight’s being the rate of recidivism, and MST’s being the high initial price. However, effectiveness aside,
Today not only do we have adults committing crimes, but millions of adolescents are committing the same crimes as adults. “Statistics show more than 1.1 million youths being arrested on a daily basis, and more than 800,000 youths belonging to different gangs (Siegel &Welsh, 2014).” It is the state juvenile authorities to deal with these children and the cost is massive. So states came up with programs to put a stop to kids becoming delinquents. With doing so they hope to save money and help kids.
Students that have been labeled “delinquent” need help in beating the odds to become successful adults. As C. Ogletree discusses article, Total Reform for a Broken System, a program needs to be created that includes family involvement and support to create concrete goals and means for students to achieve them, in the aim of becoming successful students throughout each school until graduation. It is a great goal for school institutions to strive in changing students’ behavior for the better, giving them a fair opportunity in education. Not to single out those of low-income homes, race, or learning disabilities. It should be the goal to get to the heart of misbehavior that is introducing so many students into the juvenile justice system. School institutions need to be place of supportive and structured learning from day one. Students enter school as young children, for the first time away from parents, relying on educators to guide them throughout their day. School Institutions should look for a positive approach that emphasizes on individual strengths to promote learning. The restorative circles program is having been introduced into school systems as an alternative to the zero tolerance policies. It creates an involvement of communication between all parties in any issue. Whether it be good or bad, it offers support for students to discuss issues and ideas, opening a line of communication between parents, teachers, and students, which will be key a student’s
Some conflicts we may come across would be having them participate in the program. To overcome this difficultly, our program offers, a system similar to that of Big Brothers/Big Sisters pairing an elder or an ex-gang member to act as an authoritative figure from the aboriginal community with a youth. These ex- gang members will easily relate and connect with youths, making them more comfortable with themselves, society, and with family and friends. Helping them to learn things about their culture, spirituality, language, rituals, and relationship with Mother Earth, along with the importance of education and clean living. All aboriginal youths will meet with their mentors who have become positive and influential in leading these troubled youths to success. This program will provide youth with different activities to enjoy. This includes sports, cooking, art and many other activities. If youths are interested in other activities, the program will supply what they need. In addition, youths will be taught basic skills such as communication, problem solving, and life skills aimed towards correcting behavioural problems; encouraging schooling, post-secondary and employment. This program will be offered after school as well as on all reserves. The program will be accessible for all Aboriginal youth gang members. This after school program will provide snacks and drinks to all who
...hows that most of the boys and girls showed success which gives hope because there is a program out there that is working. Hubner followed three capital offenders groups and of the seventeen boys and seven girls he followed, only two didn’t make it through the school and were sent to prison, the other fifteen were released, none have been re-arrested (Hubner, 2008).
Onwediwe, I. (2004). “Theoretical Perspectives on Juvenile Delinquency: Root Causes and Control.” ProQuest Criminal Justice, 66, 153-156.
The definition of motivation according to Kennedy (2000), “[t]he internationalist view asserts that internal and external factors influence the change process From this perspective, motivation is seen as an interpersonal process that can be influenced in a positive way by the professional (para.18). A high-risk youth is defined as a male or female between the ages of 12-17 years old who has had some contact with the law or is at risk of becoming an offender. There is a lack of motivation in some high-risk youth to positively change their lives around. According to Stinson (2009), risk factors associated with juvenile delinquency include “poor academic performance, early childhood aggression, and hyperactivity; lack of parental involvement/interaction and inadequate parental supervision and monitoring; and community/environmental factors, including access to drugs and weapons, and lack of access to community resources due to poverty” (p. 11). At risk youth that engage in community based programs in Ridge Meadows, B.C. such as KidStart, Connex, Yardworks, Community Work Service, sports and leisure and counseling, are more successful later on in their young adulthood versus high risk youth who do not attend such programs. The KidStart program is a mentoring and one-on-one program that works with youth who are at-risk and experiencing difficulties in their lives. According to PLEA (2010), “[t]he primary objective of the program is to strengthen the young person's resilience to the risk factors that are known to lead to victimization, violence and criminal activities” (para. 1). Yardworks is a program that provides youth with work experience and life skills to allow them to enter the workforce and work alongside with a PLEA staff membe...
...porated into the youth system. The only way to learn is to attempt to run different programs in the hopes of having a positive outcome. A key aspect to the betterment of our system is too asked the youth what they specifically want. According to Minaker and Hogeveen youth have stated that it is not one problem but multiple factors, these factors need to be addressed and alternatives need to be found. If the system continues not to listen to the youth there is no hopes for it to have a positive outcome on their lives.
The program I selected to discuss is The Incredible Years Program which “is a comprehensive curriculum for parents, teachers, and children that is designed to promote emotional and social competencies and prevent conduct problems in young children.”(DeLisi, M. (2013). The goals of this program are to prevent delinquency, violence, and drug abuse, provide treatment / prevention of early onset ADHD or conduct problems, and develop a community based and cost effective program. This program targets children ages 2 to 10 who show high risks to aggressive, oppositional and defiant behavior. Group sessions are held that last between 2- 2.5 hours with food, child care and transportation provided to each session. The sessions focus on praise / encouragement, building positive relationships, incentives, social skills, problem solving, proactive strategies and discipline, and emotional
The truth about crime prevention is more complicated –less utopian than some liberals would like, but far more promising than conservatives will admit. Prevention can work and that it can be far less costly, in every sense, than continuing to rely on incarceration as out first defense against violent crimes. Instead of simply insisting that prevention is better than incarceration, then, we need to pinpoint more clearly what kinds of prevention work—and why some programs work and others do not, the most encouraging efforts share important characteristics; there are reasons why they work, whether the ‘target’ population is abusive families, vulnerable teens, or serious juvenile offenders who’ve already broken the law. Likewise, there are reasons why other programs fail, no matter how fashionable or popular they may be. Given what we’ve learned about crime prevention in recent years, four priorities seem especially critical: preventing child abuse and neglect, enhancing children’s intellectual and social development, providing support and guidance to vulnerable adolescents and working intensively with juvenile offenders. These aren’t the preventive strategies that can make a difference, but they are the ones that offer the strongest evidence of effectiveness. And they also fit our growing understanding of the roots delinquency and violent crime.
In review, it is set to nudge young adults away from those peers engaging in deviant activities and influencing their deviant behavior. In theory, it will work by inducing activities between these individuals and non-deviant peers in the same age proximity. By doing this, those individuals who are use to engaging in deviant behaviors by “following the heard” or making a “default” choice will learn to stop engaging in these deviant behaviors by doing the same thing. Furthermore, they will also learn techniques in which they can redirect their thinking to make better decisions, and will be faced with a “fear” tactic to conform to non-deviant behavior. However, there are some ethical issues that would go along with the possibility of this program. The main ethical issue this program is facing is the implementation of the “fear” tactic. The idea behind this is to persuade individuals to conform to society with false information. Promoting false knowledge is not an acceptable way to help an individual and can cause an individual to have resentment to those giving this knowledge and lash out or rebellion and thus, engaging in more deviant activities than originally engaging in. Furthermore, there might also be concerns regarding the participation of non-deviant individuals. As young
For instance, its central objective is to rectify youth’s deviance behaviour that poses a threat in society such as committing petty thefts or being involved in frauds and reassuring the faith between the delinquent and the community members. Moreover, the strengths of this program are that it develops a sense of responsibility as “teens are made aware of the consequences of their actions” (Melnychuk, 2014, p.1). According to the media, the utmost influential factor that aids youth from this diversion program is the collaboration between the youth offenders and the victims, which “involves the kids attending either an accountability panel, or depending on the crime and the willingness of victims to be involved, a family conference” (Melnychuk, 2014, p.1). However, there are supplementary weaknesses that jeopardize the existence of diversion programs and their influence on youth offenders. For instance, the Ridge meadows youth diversion program continues to “to scrimp and save to get enough grant dollars to fund its $95, 000 annual budget” (Melnychuk, 2014, p.1). This conveys that diversion programs lack funding in order to attain enhanced resources and having adverse effect on youth offenders since they won’t be able to receive access to the diversion program, resulting in sentence of confinement. Overall, this program has positive influences by developing better relationships with the youth offender’s surroundings but lacks funding that only limits to minimal
Each year hundreds of thousands of teens are arrested for committing criminal offenses. For many adolescent, juvenile delinquency is just something that comes with growing up but for some it becomes a cycle that continues until their adult years. Juvenile delinquency not only effect the offender themselves but it also places a burden on society as well. Among the most abundantly stated causal factors of juvenile delinquency is broken homes. The relationship between a parent and child have been explored by countless amounts of researchers. “Children in disadvantaged families that have few opportunities for legitimate employment and face a higher risk of social exclusion are overrepresented among offenders” Juvenile