INVISIBLE CHILDREN

on November 11, 2010

. 0 Comments

A dear long term friend (from high school) committed suicide a few weeks ago.

He was a veteran who found it very hard to kill when he was in Vietnam. His letters to me from his military tour were tortured and distressed. He never wanted to hurt anyone.

He needed help but never got it. Mental health help was not a military option offered to vets post Vietnam.

My friend’s family had no idea that he would kill himself – he was such a happy and gentle man. The pain and suffering has spread to the family now and it will last forever.

My primary experience with suicide comes from the children I’ve worked with in child protection as a guardian ad-Litem and the Topamax that was proscribed to me for terrible migraine headaches.

I had become very familiar with the language on the packaging of psychotropic medications concerning depression and suicidal thoughts but was absolutely dumbstruck when I experienced depression and full blown suicidal ideation after 12 months of Topamax.

It is impossible to convey to you what that last sentence means in a manner that will impact you as it impacted me. Words will never do justice to thoughts of suicide.

I’m a mature adult that has studied and written about this terrible thing and it was absolutely overwhelming at the time. I found help and stopped the drug and got better.

I’ve come to know many children in child protection taking psychotropic medications. The data on children in child protection on these drugs is also overwhelming (and a well kept secret). Four and seven year olds behaving in extremely dangerous ways and trying to kill themselves should be extremely rare in any civil society.

I did not find it rare among the children in my caseload in child protection.

America is way behind other advanced societies in dealing with mental health issues and it is killing poor vulnerable children and way too many veterans.

Goodbye Tom, you were dear & wonderful person and a great friend; I will miss you.

Become part of KARA’s email network by sending a request to join to;

amy.rostronledoux@yahoo.com

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Files Released On Foster Teen Who Committed Suicide

Published

on November 6, 2010

http://www.kitv.com/news/25640321/detail.html

. 2 Comments

As a guardian ad-Litem, one of my first hospital visits was to a four year old in a suicide ward.

Judge Heidi Schellhas shared with me the Prozac, Ritalin, and other psychotropic medications being taken by 6, 7, and 8 year old children in her Child Protection courtroom (mostly with sporadic or non existent mental health therapies).

Other children I cared for tried to kill themselves through extremely dangerous behaviors. I’ve written about the seven children in one school district that took their own lives and the seven year old foster child who hung himself and left a note.

Misha Zubarev’s video on aging out of foster care had a great impact on me; http://www.invisiblechildren.org/2009/12/10/aging-out-of-foster-care/

Most of us would agree that caring for vulnerable children is a worthwhile endeavor.

What can we do to make suicide less of an option for abused and neglected children?

Continue reading ‘Files Released On Foster Teen Who Committed Suicide’

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We’re Number 1, & that’s not good…

Published

on October 15, 2010

The good news is that we have the treatment protocol to save these children.

. 1 Comment

The following article by Bishop Gene Robinson draws attention to youth suicide & particularly that seven students in one Minnesota school district have taken their own lives, including three teens.

GLBT issues underly most of the suicide the Bishop writes about. The idea that life can be made so unbearable for children so young is incomprehensible unless you have been near someone living the nightmare.

A gay 14 year old boy in my guardian ad-Litem caseload was physically restrained for the better part of his five week stay in a Christian group home that had promised to deal objectively with his sexual orientation. There was nothing rational about the treatment he received at this group home.

He was suicidal when he was seven & put on Ritalin with minimal mental health therapy. He has HIV AIDS today at 20.

As a result of the terrible treatment he received from his family & the lack of organized resources available to him through the child protection system, his entire life has seems to have been dangerous behaviors & a death wish.

I’ve followed the terrible stories of very young children committing suicide and experienced several first hand suicide attempts as a guardian ad-Litem.

Let’s support those programs (yes, with our tax dollars – and no, there is not a religion in the world that abandons children) Continue reading ‘We’re Number 1, & that’s not good…’

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Raised By The Courts, A Judge’s Insight Into Juvenile Justice

Published

Continue reading ‘Raised By The Courts, A Judge’s Insight Into Juvenile Justice’

on October 12, 2010

in Crime and Courts, Politics and Funding and Public Policy

. 0 Comments

Of the fifty children I worked with over twelve years as a guardian ad-Litem, several of them came to view the court as their parent. It was another trauma for the child when the County changed judges on a child after twenty or thirty courtroom visits with the same judge. The child had come to trust that this judge, who was trying to protect their best interests.

Judge Heidi Shellhas shared her genuine concern with me about the psychotropic medications proscribed to large numbers of very young children that passed through her courtroom. I was often moved by the heartfelt attempts a judge would make to see that these hearings would be personal and meaningful to an abandoned/abused child. It is not an easy task.

How impossible the job of judge must be, removing a child from her mother, or denying visitation rights to a father and knowing the system has such limited resources and is so unable to adequately serve the poor vulnerable children that come before them. Month after month, year after year, seeing these children grow up in your courtroom.

This book, RAISED BY THE COURTS: What happens when a judge has to be the parent?, brings home the feelings and heartfelt observations of a judge that has spent years working with abused and neglected children in Florida’s juvenile justice system.

This quote from the book hurts, but it needs to be circulated; “I remember bringing my Norwegian cousin to my Florida court. She runs her own child welfare agency outside of Oslo. When she saw kids ages 10, 11 and 12 in handcuffs, leg restraints and jumpsuits, she scowled and asked, “Does Amnesty International know about this?”

Judge Irene Sullivan’s observations are very painful & very accurate, and I wish everyone could know what she knows. We would treat children better, our schools would work, and our communities would be safer and happier places to live.

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254 Children, 220,000 Crimes, 12 Months

Published

on October 4, 2010

in Occasional Authors and Public Policy

. 1 Comment

KARA’s Century College Volunteer Dave Mast has written another in depth article. This one uncovers an unhealthy trend in American communities.

To approach the crisis constructively, we need to recognize what needs to happen to decrease drug use by younger and younger children. I would point out that the Missouri model for treating youthful offenders had a dramatic positive impact on juvenile recidivism when it was implemented, and that many states are spending over $200,000 per year per juvenile on punishment oriented models with consistently high failure rates.

As former MN Chief Justice Kathleen Blatz stated about children in child protection, “The difference between that poor child and a felon is about eight years”.

Drug Use by Juvenile Offenders
By Dave Mast
10/3/2010

The fact that substance abuse and other crimes are often related is certainly not a secret.

This can be seen every day in the newspaper, in magazines, and on the television news. The same can be said of substance abuse and juvenile delinquency. When children and adolescents get involved with drugs, they often find themselves on pathways to more serious offenses.

What many people do not know is the tremendous extent to which this problem has grown in recent years. Nor are many people aware of the costs that result from juvenile substance abuse.

Drug use and sale in American schools has been the highlight of much research performed on this topic. The National Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse (CASA) at Columbia University conducts a survey each year aimed at discovering trends in teenage drug use. The survey this year has identified a drastic increase in the percentage of children attending middle schools considered “drug-infested,” meaning that drugs are kept, used, or sold on school property. This year’s survey showed that 32 percent of middle school students were attending drug infested schools, compared to 23 percent in 2009.

The data related to high schools is also rather disturbing. The CASA survey from 2006 showed that 51 percent of high schools were drug-infested, and this figure has risen to 66 percent this year (Feuerberg, 2010).

With drugs being readily available to teens of all ages, the results of juvenile substance abuse are just as noticeable. A 2002 report produced by the National Institute of Justice’s Arrestee Drug Abuse Monitoring (ADAM) program showed that almost 60 percent of male juvenile arrestees and 30 percent of female juvenile arrestees tested positive for marijuana use (Siegel & Welsh, 2006, p. 384).

A study conducted in Miami looked more specifically at the number of crimes committed by juveniles who abused crack cocaine. The 254 children interviewed by the researchers reported committing a combined total of more than 220,000 crimes in the 12 months prior to the study (Siegel & Welsh, 2006, p. 385). Continue reading ’254 Children, 220,000 Crimes, 12 Months’

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How Can We Raise The Profile Of Children’s Issues?

Published

on September 22, 2010

. 3 Comments

Few politicians speak to the children’s issues. Fewer still understand or advocate for programs that would help the 3 million children reported to child protection services each year.

Children have no voice, no lobby, and no vote to impact the policies that impact their lives.

It is up to those of us that know the issues and understand the needs, to advocate for those who cannot.

If we don’t speak up for them, who will?

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Children’s Rally 10-10-10 Give Voice To Children’s Issues

Published

Continue reading ‘Children’s Rally 10-10-10 Give Voice To Children’s Issues’

on September 18, 2010

in Events, Politics and Funding and Public Policy

. 1 Comment

With aggressive politics everywhere, it is easy not to hear law makers address the underlying children’s issues that are expressly responsible for the quality of life in our communities.

Not all states give voice to our weakest and most vulnerable citizens. This rally is a big step for children and it deserves to be copied and repeated.

Lobbying from well funded groups insure that their voices will be heard and that voters provide money and legislation for business and outspoken citizens on their issues.

Children, especially abused and neglected children, have no voice. For too many years our communities have been unable to build enough support to launch at risk children successfully into adulthood. 80% of youth aging out of foster care lead dysfunctional lives. Three million children a year are reported to child protection in this nation, almost a million a year end up in foster care.

A five year old child can’t call a legislator and ask for day care so he doesn’t have to spend part of the day alone or with a drug using or dysfunctional adult because mom can’t afford day care.

The six year old will not call child protection because of the drugs or terrible things done to her by a family member (she can’t read and doesn’t know how wrong these things are).

Ignoring the needs of the weakest and most vulnerable among us has had terrible consequences (read the newspaper – watch TV).

Our lack of understanding for the programs, resources, and basic concern for children has filled our prisons, troubled our communities, and made our schools struggle with educating children who are not prepared to learn.

We owe it to ourselves to understand the economics and underlying realities that face children in our society today. There are no easy answers, but not knowing the issues or the obvious results of ignoring at risk children guarantees that troubled children will continue to struggle with becoming contributing members of our communities.

It is hard to deny help to children that you know. Vote For Children’s Issues

Come to this rally. If you live in another state, Copy the intention of this rally and organize one at your state capital.

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Response to Star Tribune Article

Published

on September 12, 2010

http://www.startribune.com/lifestyle/health/102698419.html

. 0 Comments

Yes to constructive solutions; more resources for troubled families and help for abused and neglected children.

No to destructive and inflammatory criticisms of people trying hard to make life livable for terribly abused and neglected children within an overwhelmed social services system and not enough resources to do the job. It’s almost impossible work and there is little support for the worker or the child these days.

Nothing has been said about the actual violence done to these children that has occurred to place them in a county system.

Twelve years watching abused and neglected children traumatized by abuse and neglect has changed my view on this topic.
Please keep the goal of saving children the priority.

My one dispute with this article would be the statistic that 223 children in the child protection system suffered from sexual abuse. In 2005 when I wrote the book INVISIBLE CHILDREN there were 897 cases of child sex abuse in MN. At that time I was an active guardian ad-Litem and knew of fifty cases of child sex abuse. It was terrifically under-reported then, it is even more so now. The children that suffer these abuses need more help than they are receiving.

Our schools would function better and our communities would be safer and happier if we put more resources into struggling families and abused and neglected children.

These articles might make my points more clearly;

http://www.invisiblechildren.org/2010/03/20/burn-injuries-make-up-10-of-all-child-abuse-cases/

http://www.invisiblechildren.org/2010/06/11/how-can-we-better-serve-abused-and-neglected-children/

http://www.invisiblechildren.org/2010/02/28/a-very-critical-look-at-foster-care/

http://www.invisiblechildren.org/2008/08/21/brutal-truths-and-best-practices-forum/

Continue reading ‘Response to Star Tribune Article’

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Really Good Child Advocacy Links

Published

on August 31, 2010

http://www.minnesotamedicine.com/CurrentIssue/tabid/3020/Default.aspx

. 3 Comments

Today’s post are my best sources for information about U.S. children.

The Arizona article should cause us all to respond.

It identifies a nightmarish trend as America allows the murder of it’s very young children without safeguards. I was called by newspaper reporters repeatedly last summer when an 18 month old baby drowned after 14 visits by child protection. The reporters were surprised to hear of my own case where 49 police calls were reported to a home where the 7 year old girl was finally removed from the home only because she tried to kill her younger sister in the presence of the police (the seven year old had most likely been prostituted in the home).

Blaming overworked and under-resourced child protection workers is not the answer. These stories are becoming more common and more frightening across the U.S. Caring for children beats outrage. Nothing is solved if child protection doesn’t have the support or resources to act.

Arizona appears to be reaching a crisis politically with its divisive attitudes towards poor people and immigrants. No one wins when children lose. Society will pay the price when these children become unable to transition into adulthood.

I welcome national and international information that you send me for future reference.

In the hopes of building a better advocacy network for children everywhere;

Academy Against Violence and Abuse, www.avahealth.org

http://www.kidsdata.org/blog/?p=1202

At kidsdata.org, we aim to give you the data you need to tell the stories you need to tell, whether those stories are about policies that need to change, programs that need support, or issues that need attention. New research commissioned by Child Advocacy 360 sheds light on the kinds of stories that move people to action on behalf of children and youth.

Child Welfare in the News

Subscribe to this service by sending an email to; cwn@childwelfare.gov

HI: Backlogs reported in Department of Human Services

The Associated Press State & Local Wire August 31, 2010

State workers have told legislators that backlogs of welfare, food stamp and medical applications need to be solved.

http://thegardenisland.com/news/state-and-regional/article_551042e1-74df-5932-b704-82298f437db8.html

Continue reading ‘Really Good Child Advocacy Links’

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Attitude Adjustment; Children Count

Published

on August 26, 2010

Continue reading ‘Attitude Adjustment; Children Count’

. 5 Comments

As a volunteer child protection worker, I pay attention to the negative attitude a growing number of our adult population are promoting toward issues impacting children.

When I listen to the political discussions that affect at risk children with neighbors, family, and friends, I often hear them blame the poor habits or behaviors of one of their own acquaintances as an example of why trying to help is wasteful. It’s as if people feel an accomplishment in blaming a child’s parents instead of offering constructive suggestion that might improve a child’s life.

A close relative explained to me how a nine year old child was fully capable of correcting and dealing with the drunken and dysfunctional behavior of an abusive parent (and therefore should not need community help). A neighbor speaks of someone with mental health issues as if that person should just “make better decisions”.

It is hard to argue with people that make ungrounded (completely false) statements and don’t care about the children they speak of or otherwise clearly misunderstand the issues.

My close relative had her own fetal alcohol baby and should have been the first to know that community involvement in prenatal care would have a positive impact on the 600,000 fetal alcohol babies born in the U.S. each year. America has the highest preteen pregnancy rate in the industrialized world & one in four U.S. teens has a sexually transmitted disease, the highest in the industrialized world – we’re number one.

Support KARA’s effort to stop punishing children; sponsor a conversation in your community (invite me to speak at your conference) / Buy our book or donate

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Accentuate The Positive; Child-Parent Centers

Published

on August 10, 2010

in education, Occasional Authors and Public Policy

. 2 Comments

Dave Mast’s research on the positive impact Child-Parent Centers have on the lives of at risk children and his observations on why our nation still struggles with supporting them is powerful. Send it to your friends.

Dave is a KARA volunteer intern from Century College and an occasional author on this site;

The Positive Effects of Child-Parent Centers on Education
By Dave Mast

Few problems facing children of all ages have been discussed as often as that of substandard education. More specifically, the American education system has been under attack from a number of sources.
However, the situation has yet to improve, possibly because the programs that work are not highlighted, instead only those that have failed are.

How bad has the situation in the United States become? Roughly 18% of children are not familiar with the basic rules of printing or writing. However, when looking at children with mothers who did not obtain their high school diplomas, this number increased drastically to 32%. In contrast, only 8% of children with mothers who have college degrees struggle with the basic rules of writing (Siegel & Welsh, 2006, p. 336).

The seriousness of the state of America’s education system can be demonstrated by looking at the effects, both short and long-term, that the failure of the system can have on a child. For example, the annual income that a juvenile can expect to earn as an adult is significantly lower if he or she drops out of high school. For adults 18-65 years old, the average annual income of high school dropouts is only $20,000, compared to $30,000 for those who graduate from high school or obtain their GED (Siegel & Welsh, 2006, p. 336).

A grimmer example of the effects that unsuccessful education can have on children is related to criminal activity. Though 74% of non-offenders graduated from high school, only 9% of chronic offenders obtained their diplomas. Another look at the subject shows that less than 40% of incarcerated felons in America completed 12 or more years of education. In contrast, 80% of the general population has completed the same level of education.

More important than identifying the effects that educational failure can have on children is the need to determine which programs are effective in stopping such a downward spiral and making them available to more American children. Arguably one of the best programs to date was started in Chicago in 1967 and uses what are known as Child-Parent Centers (CPCs). CPCs are located in low income areas in the Chicago public school system, and are available for children to start at three to five years of age.

Through parental involvement, the children enrolled in CPCs are able to develop reading, writing, and math skills, while their parents learn about topics related to child growth, development, health, safety, and nutrition (Chicago Public Schools, 2010).

The benefits reaped from enrollment in CPCs have been demonstrated in a number of studies involving juveniles and adults who received educational enrichment from the program. One such study was conducted by Reynolds, Temple, Robertson, and Mann in 2001. This study compared a group of adults who had completed an educational program at a CPC prior to entering kindergarten with a group whose members had not been enrolled in a CPC. Continue reading ‘Accentuate The Positive; Child-Parent Centers’

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Voting For Children

Published

on August 3, 2010

http://www.everychildmatters.org/Minnesota/News/MN-Candidate-Survey-Responses.html

. 1 Comment

Any study of the subject indicates that healthy children become healthy adults and better citizens and the opposite, unhealthy children become dysfunctional adults and poor citizens.

Voting for the people, programs, and policies that help children become healthy adults and better citizens seems like only practical vote to cast. Below is the link to the Minnesota Governor’s Candidate Survey Responses

The Minnesota Children’s Platform Coalition (MNCPC) is a collaboration of organizations and individuals who care about Minnesota children and youth and public policy issues affecting them. The questions in this survey were created by the MNCPC following a “World Café” meeting in January 2010 of coalition partners who discussed policy issues they thought were important for a Minnesota governor to address.

Every politician needs to sharpen their understanding of the issues that are at the very heart of our culture and community. For schools to work and communities to be safe and happy, children must have the support they need to achieve a level of learning and wellness to function at grade level in school and cope with community life.

Some politicians are not hearing the underrepresented children crying out for help. Follow Every Child Matters and its solid effort to create awareness among the people that make the laws and policies in your community. Make it your business to represent those children that cannot speak for themselves who will not read at grade level, graduate from high school or stay out of our voracious court/prison system without our help.

All children want to be happy, normal, functioning people. My years as a guardian ad-Litem taught me the lesson at a very personal level. I cringe when I see politicians voting against basic needs for children, Daycare, homelessness, education, and healthcare are critical issues for children.

Let’s make it our business to point out to our politicians that investing in children is nothing more than investing in our community. And it is the right thing to do. Take action, make a phone call to a legislator in support of a child friendly issue, forward this piece to your friends, and make it a piece of your conversation today.

Support KARA, download, buy our book or donate

Support our PSA program for Abused and Neglected Children

Continue reading ‘Voting For Children’

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Citizen Review Panels Advocating For Abused & Neglected Children

Published

http://www.ldnews.com/news/ci_15513594

on July 17, 2010

in Invisible Children, Politics and Funding and Public Policy

. 0 Comments

The article below outlines a positive approach to educating a public and service providers to what is working and what needs improvement to insure a better practices approach to serving the needs of abused and neglected children in your community.

Getting more people involved in gathering and disseminating information about the issues of child abuse and what can and should be done to protect and serve vulnerable children has to be a good thing.

After many years as a volunteer guardian ad Litem it is clear to me that most folks don’t have a very good concept of the needs of abused and neglected children. It is also obvious that abused and neglected children are not being well served in our nation today.

Too many of them do not receive the help they need and are going lead dysfunctional lives. They hurt themselves and the community they live in.

Supporting positive change for the hardworking people that do the work to improve the lives of abused and neglected children and appreciating that results will always be a product of effort and an efficient application of resources is sound policy.

The focus must remain on improving the quality of services to children, and not politics and name calling.

This process can add accountability and provide a positive source of insight and overview of the complex system of children, courts, foster and adoptive parents, and service providers.

The downside is that if the panel is not well constructed and well managed, it can become a negative force of unsupportive, nonconstructive people that will not help build a more effective child protection system in your community. Be certain to bring only positive well meaning people that care about the needs of children on to your panel.

Support KARA buy our book or donate

Become part of KARA’s email network by sending a request to join to;

amy.rostronledoux@yahoo.com

Continue reading ‘Citizen Review Panels Advocating For Abused & Neglected Children’

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What Oklahoma Will Show The Nation

Published

on July 11, 2010

Continue reading ‘What Oklahoma Will Show The Nation’

. 4 Comments

Recently a class action lawsuit was filed in Oklahoma claiming that children are being mistreated within the child protection system. http://www.tulsaworld.com/news/article.aspx?subjectid=14&articleid=20100708_14_A1_Marcia556191

It was filed against various DHS officials in Tulsa federal court in February 2008. The judge is unhappy that DHS is taking too long to prepare for the trial.

The plaintiffs (children) ask for improvements in the following areas:

Lower Caseloads for DHS workers and supervisors.

Education and training for agency employees, foster parents and adoptive parents.

Monitoring of the safety of children in state custody.

The original plaintiffs were nine children who are alleged to have suffered in DHS placements. The case has since become a class-action lawsuit with thousands of children in DHS custody as plaintiff

How many states have caseloads that are just too high to provide a realistic safety net for the children they support? How many states need more training and education for the agency employees, foster parents, and adoptive parents?

Without educating judges, court workers, and criminal justice people, this nation is still on the path to maintaining excessive prison populations and disastrous school performance among the population of abused and neglected children.

This is the tip of the iceberg. Legislators in many states ought to be finding money to make these changes without class action lawsuits. To think that we are a nation forced to sue on behalf of abused and neglected children because legislators did not see the need to provide the services or resources to keep children safe shows a deep failure within our system.

To those social workers and supervisors that will be made to look bad as this case becomes news; you need to stick together and make your arguments clear and concise. Support each other and recognize that it is a glaring fault of an uncaring institution that would make the people doing the hard work look bad when failure is almost guaranteed as resources are stretched too thinly. Stick together, support each other, and make your arguments to the public. The size and scope of this problem has become too large to keep buried and silent.

America’s child protection systems need help at many levels. Like all of us, social workers do the best they can with the resources they have.

Children need this victory. They will have more resources and support if the case is resolved fairly (& maybe legislators will see the wisdom of avoiding class action lawsuits and vote for more child friendly programs).

There needs to be more money for training and services.

Without it, abused and neglected children will continue to become preteen moms & felons and lead dysfunctional lives in and out of our institutions, costing our nation a multiple of what we might have spent saving them with the price of training and services when they were young.

America is on trial here. Oklahoma is not the only state to abandon its abandoned children.

Here are a few other examples;

http://www.invisiblechildren.org/2010/06/01/cant-make-this-stuff-up/

http://www.invisiblechildren.org/2010/06/18/the-state-of-child-welfare/

http://www.invisiblechildren.org/2010/06/30/tip-of-the-iceberg-abused-children-dying-due-to-county-backlogs/

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Art Rolnick & Pliny, Friends of Children

Published

It was my purpose to draw attention to the behavior problems and learning ability that I see in abused and neglected children that continue to negatively impact our schools and later on, the safety of our communities.

Art’s Federal Reserve Board research clearly demonstrates the high return on investment in children (8% to 16%)

on July 5, 2010

in education, Politics and Funding and Public Policy

. 0 Comments

Lori Sturdevant points out in her July 4th Star Tribune column how Minnesota “has been missing the biggest public investment opportunity – early education” and how Art Rolnick’s extensive studies as director of research at the Federal Reserve Board have made those investments measurable.

Just like investing in the stock market or tax increment financing, putting money into early childhood programs brings solid financial and social returns back into a community.

As a negative example, just look at states and nations that have not (failing schools, filled prisons, high crime, poverty, preteen pregnancies, & unsafe communities).

At every level, this state has benefited from a smart, educated workforce that created opportunities (out of genius and thin air) with lasting impact.

Medical alley, which has had a huge impact on this state’s fiscal well being, launched giant successful med tech companies and would not have done nearly so well without the very smart people that came through this states many fine schools and school programs because they were important at the time and well funded.

Children in Minnesota have had a friend and champion in Art Rolnick, who well understands Pliny’s 2500 year old observation, “What we do to our children, they will do to our society”.

It is easy to see the relationship between healthy, adjusted children and productive citizens.

Healthy, adjusted children do well in school and go on to lead lives that contribute to the well being of our community (and of course, the opposite is just as true).

There is no return on investment from children that we abandon in our system and the cost of crime and incarceration is a triple negative that can cost our state for a lifetime (five hundred million dollars for prisons in MN this year does not include the medical costs, the cost of crime, fear, or blighted neighborhoods). The relationship between success in school and crime and preteen pregnancy is well established.

Art refers to medical costs driving state deficits. A growing body of evidence from the medical community proves that the chronic disease and medical costs of at risk children is another extreme cost to our communities (www.avahealth.org – this site is worth spending some time on)

I met Art Rolnick a few years ago when he graciously allowed me to use his work (as chapter five) in the writing of my book INVISIBLE CHILDREN.

There is even a higher return on investment for Invisible Children (three million children are reported to child protection services in this nation each year in this nation) to make them ready to learn and prepare them for a place in our community.

These are the children I continue to watch and hope for as budgets and services are cut and policy makers think they are saving money by not investing in programs that could change the lives of the weakest and most vulnerable among us.

On top of all this positive financial and socially important evidence, it is the right thing to do.

“Rolnick has been sounding the alarm about early ed since 2003… Little kids don’t vote…Early ed has a champion in Rolnick. Now it needs one in the Governors office”.

Continue reading ‘Art Rolnick & Pliny, Friends of Children’

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Tip Of The Iceberg; Abused Children Dying Due To County Backlogs

Published

Continue reading ‘Tip Of The Iceberg; Abused Children Dying Due To County Backlogs’

on June 30, 2010

in Invisible Children and Public Policy

. 0 Comments

The Los Angeles Times article below points out the tragic preventable death of 2 year old little Joseph due to a backlog of 12,000 cases. There are not enough social workers to visit the families. The public outrage leads to blaming social workers when we should be looking at ourselves.

Blaming social workers for murdered babies is like blaming the police for who rides in the squad car and it won’t solve anything. Until the caseloads become more reasonable and the departments get the resources they need to improve the lives of the children they visit, the suffering and death of innocent children will continue to rise.

It is a terrible indictment of our society (what is it we value?)

What frightens me most about this story is the counties move to hide information about the continued death and abuse of children in the county system. Their argument is that it puts the family on trial and brings terrible publicity to the department.

The counter to this is that until the public and policymakers understand the numbers, the suffering, and the hopelessness these families are living in, the cycle will continue to expand generation after generation as it has for about fifty years. Change will not come without awareness of the need for change.

The topic is uncomfortable so we avoid it.

The truth makes us look bad so we hide the information.

Child sex abuse, neglect, and violence against children in this nation have grown exponentially and by not reporting this bad news we are only delaying the reckoning that we must face (and helpless children are dying because of the hiding and underreporting of information). Get the real information from the medical community; www.avahealth.org

A Minneapolis baby suffered the exact same type of bathtub drowning death last year after 14 calls to child protection. I was called by the Minneapolis Star Tribune reporters who were surprised when I told them that as a volunteer CASA guardian ad Litem one of my cases had 49 police calls to a home before the children were removed from the home (and then, only because the seven year old tried to kill the five year old in the presence of the police).

Abused and neglected children have no voice but the social workers and police that visit their homes. When a worker has a monstrous caseload, babies die and children suffer. Abused children suffer their traumas for life and communities bear that cost in the courts, schools, and unsafe communities that result from their double abandonment.

We have money for wars, big stadiums, and even in times of economic downturns we afford what is important to maintain our lifestyle.

Funding programs for abused and neglected children is the very least we can do to assert ourselves as a civilized people.

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Big Nursery School Debate in Sweden

Published

on June 20, 2010

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An article from the Economist Magazine demonstrates how the teaching of Swedish rules and social behavior in nursery schools are helping children to be strong and make decisions for themselves, making some immigrant families uncomfortable.

As practical as subsidized daycare and growing a child’s self confidence and decision making ability is, there has been a backlash from parents tied to old ways.

Critical thinking and Swedish values are causing conflict in families steeped in cultural traditions. It will be interesting to see how this story develops. Continue reading ‘Big Nursery School Debate in Sweden’

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What Happened To Portia?

Published

on June 9, 2010

in Invisible Children, Occasional Authors and Public Policy

. 0 Comments

I’ve known the author of the following article for a long time and only now heard her story. It is a very sad story that happens when service providers are overworked, undertrained, and as you will read, unable to rise to their complicated tasks.

In defense of the profession, in the twelve years I worked as a guardian ad-Litem, this story did not happen to me. The social workers I was engaged with were truly committed and in this line of work because they loved kids and wanted to make a difference in their community. Social work is a calling (being a nanny pays way better and is much easier).

It is my belief that people want to do their work well, especially when it involves the welfare of abandoned, helpless children. This story does not reflect that.

When a person fails to complete a simple task, and a tragedy occurs, we (the system/management) should find the problem and insure that it can’t happen again.

The problem lies it a system that is not well designed to see to the well being of the children it is meant to serve. This system is being undermined by our current economic chaos, and children are suffering.

There needs to be accountability and a greater responsiveness built into our child protection system. This will not happen without public support and more resources.

Not valuing children reflects badly on our society and it is beginning to show.

If children were as important as expensive business machines, the doctor would have had the authority to save this child’s life (or some other fail safe process would have been in place.

KARA supports more training, better resources, and greater attention to the needs of social workers, teachers, and service providers to at risk children, because it is difficult work.

This unfortunately cannot change what happened to Portia. Continue reading ‘What Happened To Portia?’

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Advanced or Stupid? It’s How You Frame It.

Published

on June 3, 2010

in Crime and Courts, education, Politics and Funding and Public Policy

. 0 Comments

The world’s most advanced technical and military power, greatest economic engine (California ranked fourth highest GDP among nations at one time) & we are refusing to take care of our children.

25% of U.S. high school grads are functionally illiterate upon graduation, our drop out rates are the worst in the industrialized world.

America is sending juveniles into adult prisons at alarming rates. By privatizing service providers, overwhelming government service agencies, & not providing resources we are abandoning children at an institutional level.

Many third world nations treat prenatal care more seriously than we do. There are no industrial nations that suffer the sexually transmitted disease rates or early pregnancy rates that America does.

Talking to the people at The Academy on Violence and Abuse http://www.avahealth.org/ very important things have become clear to me;

1. Child abuse impact children for life. Chronic illness and early death are significant within the population of abused and neglected children as they age.

2. Dr Bruce Perry’s research indicates that 25% of all American’s will be classified as “special needs” within a generation if the mental health aspects are not addressed in a direct and meaningful way.

As a long time guardian ad-Litem, I have seen the evidence of the Academy’s research at a very personal level. I have lost friends and now know why.

Mental health becomes all important when you work with the population of abused children and understand the concept of violence, sex abuse, and trauma as it applies to two and three year olds (and what it will mean to them for the rest of their lives).

Children become citizens. Healthy citizens lead normal productive lives and are a benefit to society.

Children born into unhealthy homes and poor resources, are abandoned, abused, or ignored, end up in juvenile justice, criminal justice, pregnant without the ability to parent (just like their parent) lead painful lives and are a problem for society.

There is NO percentage is the communal abandonment of our children (it is sinking our nation).

What you do to your children, they will do to your society (Pliny – 2500 years ago)

Let’s all agree to support child friendly programs and legislation (even if it costs money and takes effort).

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Can’t Make This Stuff Up

Published

Continue reading ‘Can’t Make This Stuff Up’

on June 1, 2010

in Invisible Children, Politics and Funding, Public Policy and The States

. 0 Comments

An article appearing in the Star Tribune May 29th by Seema Jilani (Houston Pediatric physician) points out the stunning impact that the economic chaos and anti tax sentiment are having on the abused and neglected children that I came to know as a volunteer guardian ad-Litem.

It is painful to know that children who come from trauma and abuse, are now finding fewer services, more burdened staff, less resources, and inevitably, less chance of finding help in many communities.

Seema points out that a Hawaii program that had serviced 4000 families now services 100, South Carolina now has caseload ratios as high as 60 to 1 in some regions & that nearly half of the abused children murdered in Texas have been investigated by Child Protective Services.

I did know most of the financial problems facing the people and programs created to help abused and neglected children. I also know that eliminating those programs will not save communities any money*.

I did not know that children raised in families with incomes under $15,000 are 22 times more likely to to be abused and I am well aware of the dismal standing of certain states when it comes to how they treat children.

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Mad At The Wrong People (throwing baby out with bathwater again)

Published

on May 22, 2010

in Invisible Children and Public Policy

. 4 Comments

I hear mean things said about foster & adoptive parents, social workers, educators, and guardian ad-Litems too often.

Many people involved in child protection are receiving unfair treatment. This is why I became a guardian – a friend’s adoption problems prompted me to act). Now, as funding drys up and services are restricted or eliminated, results are worsening and more and more people are being mistreated by service providers.

It is easy to blame the teachers, social workers, and guardians ad-litem and argue for the dissolution of the system when we are mistreated by it.

How simple the solution; fire them all, kill the programs, and everything will be improved.

After working with service providers over a twelve year period as a volunteer guardian ad-litem, and knowing how impossible their tasks are, with the training they receive (and don’t receive), the resources they have (and don’t have) and the overwhelming amount of work they are burdened with each day, I know that the rest of us are missing a VERY BIG point.

America’s institutions need support and improvement and not destructive criticism*.

It is because programs are underfunded and and under-supported that training and standards are lower than they should be, which puts under-trained and under-qualified people into high stress positions without adequate training or tools to do the work.

NO, it is we the people that have voted to underfund our schools and social programs (and 35W bridge maintenance) that have created the painful failure we are living with today. The bridge fell in the river for the same reason our schools, jails, and child protection systems are struggling so mightily-we failed to maintain it.

It’s not the lack of commitment from the people that go to work every day trying hard to make a difference in their community and the lives of the children in their classrooms or caseloads (I’m really convinced of this).

It is America’s inability to face the fact that we have created monster problems that will continue to worsen until we support solutions that will fix them (and not just hate on the people doing the work).

Over my twelve twelve years in the system, I have found the teachers, social workers, and guardians, to be a very committed bunch of people. It is hard work and they are attacked from most sectors (troubled parents, the public, the media, and not much support back at the office). Art teachers have wept as they have told me their stories. Social workers on the east and west coast have it really hard when it comes to bad press and not much help back at the office (from comments made to me after the United Nations talk and my research).

I have experienced and written about the huge mistakes made and the great pain to all involved because of our failing institutions, but to listen to people demanding the destruction of the guardian ad-litem program instead of improving it, would leave children with absolutely no voice in an already cold and overwhelming system.

Foster and adoptive parents face a complicated system with unpredictable results due to the institutions we continue to band aid together to cope with the growing problems we are facing. The people I’ve met are sincere, many of them poor and trying to help children and their community with very limited resources and very troubled children. Many communities are barely able to make life tolerable for foster children. This may explain the recent statistic that 80% of youth aging out of foster care are leading dysfunctional lives.

To blame social workers when a baby is found in a dumpster is wrong. The case loads the American public demands social workers carry and the scarce resources that are available for struggling families and children explains why the vast majority of violent crime committed by youth came out of under 4% of Ramsey county family (A.C.E. study) and 90 percent of the youth in juvenile justice have come through the child protection system (according to former Supreme Court Chief Justice Kathleen Blatz). It also explains why American girls have among the highest STD and preteen pregnancy rates in the world.

Blaming Teachers for failed schools in like holding police officers accountable for the criminal in the squad car. Until children are ready to learn, we are making educators managers of out of control children, not teachers. The amount of Prozac, Ritalin, and other psychotropic medications proscribed to American youth (without therapy) is astronomical. Teachers would be astounded if they knew the data.

It is up to us who are working for positive change that we recognize who are friends are and quit throwing rocks at them.

Here are some positive suggestions, please add more through the comment section; Continue reading ‘Mad At The Wrong People (throwing baby out with bathwater again)’

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Growing Up Foster

Published

on May 1, 2010

The choice is ours.
Continue reading ‘Growing Up Foster’

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It would be so nice if our community would recognize the issues facing abused and neglected children and make it easier for them instead of harder.

In most cases, it is would be a minimal cost (especially compared to the cost of not supporting them), but in any event, if there is a person deserving of some cost, it would be a child removed from a birth home for the trauma they have suffered.

This weeks Star Tribune article by Eric Roper http://www.startribune.com/politics/national/92467749.html?elr=KArks8c7PaP3E77K_3c::D3aDhUMEaPc:E7_ec7PaP3iUiacyKUnciatkEP7DhUr puts a child’s words to the experience of living in multiple homes and ten different schools and trying to lead a normal life. Not many of us could do that successfully.

My own experience as a guardian reminds me of the many county children that did very poorly in school because of the traumas they had suffered and the behavioral problems they brought with them to school, and to their foster and adoptive homes (and into the communities they lived in).

“You’re in a new home,. You don’t know these people”. “you feel like a burden”.

The powerful point of the article is that the system is broken and children are suffering.

Minnesota’s Former Supreme Court Chief Justice Kathleen Blatz has stated that “the difference between that poor child & a felon is about eight years” and “about 90% of the youth in the juvenile justice system have passed through the child protection system”.

The data supports her.

We could provide more as a community to make the paths easier for abused and neglected children with programs and support from the community.

Or, we can go on producing preteen moms and juvenile felons with tightfisted & hard hearted public policies toward youth.

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Organized For Children In Canada

Published

on April 30, 2010

. 0 Comments

We Value Children

An impressive video statement about the importance of attending to the needs of youth. Cheers for our neighbors to the north.

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Kids For Cash, Privatizing Punishment, What Could Be More Wrong?

Published

on April 30, 2010

in Crime and Courts and Public Policy

. 0 Comments

http://www.philly.com/inquirer/local/pa/20100430_Ex-judge_pleads_guilty_in_Luzerne__kids-for-cash__scandal.html This judge should go to prison for the thousands of young lives he destroyed with his money making scheme to send kids to detention facilities while he was paid millions in commission (20 people were in on the deal, including a school superintendent).

There are strong arguments to be made for separating private enterprise and policing and punishment, not the least of which Michael T Conahan has proven beyond mere words (2.8 million dollars in commissions).

I can tolerate the stealing of money but I am not able to stand by and watch children denied their youth because those of us that vote (and run this nation) don’t see the connection between healthy institutions and healthy children.

It is up to us as citizens to have the depth of understanding and concern with our community to see how what happened in Pennsylvania is happening by degrees to youth throughout our state and our nation (just without the commissions).

We have not yet fully understood and agreed that healthy youth make healthy adults and citizens, and that ensuring that youth have a solid chance to be healthy is worth the investment.

Until that happens, we will continue to underfund programs that help struggling children and families with health and mental health and live with the results that we have been getting for so many years. I draw your attention to the ACE study in Ramsey County that points out the great majority of violence and serious crime committed by juveniles in St Paul was committed by youth from three or four percent of the families in the community http://www.tacommunities.org/getfile/view/id/1000/cid/1004/p/folder_1004%252Ffolder_5040

Helping these children helps us all. Better schools, safer streets, a more educated work force, and healthier communities (less frightening newspapers and TV news).

Let’s get behind this; Denounce the cuts in programs (it won’t save money in the long run) Vote for the people that understand the value of healthy youth and families.
Continue reading ‘Kids For Cash, Privatizing Punishment, What Could Be More Wrong?’

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The Consequences of Media Concentrating On Negative Child Protection & Adoption

Published

Contact KARA with your questions and support. Please contact us with your questions, referrals, and donations.

on April 26, 2010

in education and Public Policy

. 0 Comments

If it bleeds it leads, is the standard newsroom motto. Adults suffer the consequences of trial by media regularly and I don’t see that changing in my lifetime.

*We live in a time when newsrooms don’t have budgets to adequately follow complicated stories, like child protection, adoption, foster care & the other very serious issues that social workers, educators, parents & other service providers must study deeply to manage abused and neglected children.

A brief interview covering the death of a child in child protection leads to a short news story making a social worker look inadequate (or worse) bringing outrage from a community, and even less support for an already overburdened department of human services. Almost no attention is paid to the lack of resources, low salaries, and patchwork system that holds together the millions of children and workers across this nation.

When a baby is found in a dumpster, too many of us are not trained to dig down deep for compassion and understanding and ask ourselves what we could do to prevent this. Just where could we put more and better resources? Who could I call to show support for programs supporting pregnant preteen moms?

Our media response quite often drives us to an opposite response of quick anger and blaming, and even less compassion and support for our already overworked social workers, foster care providers, educators and everyone else in the system.

It is telling to note that we were in the top five as a nation in the quality of life indices for over twenty years among the 24 industrialized nations with 200 year democracies and now we don’t compare ourselves to them (but to the 90 or so “emerging nations”).

We desperately need to agree that children in need of services will receive them. The cost is minimal as compared to their expense in crime, prisons and jails over their lifetimes and is now well documented.

How to deal with a media that does not have resources to adequately report the details that lead to the baby in the dumpster, drowned in the bathtub, or 7 year old that hung himself?

My suggestion is to change the rule social workers are taught during their training from “never talk about your work outside of work” to “use your own judgement, be legally and personally discreet, but feel free to discuss the nature of child protection, the circumstance that are common to you in your work, and by all means, the needs you see not being met in the lives of abused and neglected children”.

As it is today, abused and neglected children have no voice in the terribly abusive homes they are raised in nor the court system once they are removed from those homes.

Some of us, preferably some of us educated in the study of the issues; social workers, health and mental health providers, and others close and sympathetic to abused and neglected children, needs to give these children a voice in their own lives other than a Media that has to sell itself with “if it bleeds it leads”.

*I’m not blaming anyone. Newspapers don’t have money to pay people, the system is what it is. There are many great reporters trying to do good work, but it is an uphill slog against terrific odds. This is a complicated topic that does not lend itself to the type of news we have prepared American citizens to comprehend.

Kids At Risk Action needs your support for its successful launch of televised public service announcements building awareness to the issues surrounding child abuse.

In collaboration with award winning Salo of Finland, KARA is working to create and place ads on national TV.

These ads will reach millions and create interest and understanding of this important and often misunderstood subject.

The KARA team.

ps… pass this on to those you think might appreciate the opportunity;

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This Weeks Important At Risk Youth News

Published

Continue reading ‘This Weeks Important At Risk Youth News’

on April 18, 2010

in Kids At Risk Action (KARA), Politics and Funding, Public Policy and The States

. 0 Comments

This is a compilation of recent news that reflects the conditions of youth and youth policy in the U.S. this past few weeks. Thank you Jamie Wilt for your hard work and Century College for your great programs.

I would like reader comments on the style and substance of this article and appreciate receiving information from you about youth programs, policy, and data.

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How To Improve A Child Protection System

Published

on April 1, 2010

. 0 Comments

It is easy to blame people doing the work, but almost always more honest to look upstream to see what process is in place for the workers to follow. Poor process almost insures bad results. Add to that extensive workloads and minimal resources, any positive results become elusive.

I have found social workers to be hard working and caring people, & frustrated like the rest of us in our troubled communities.

In business, outcomes are measured and process is controlled by results desired.

Once the process has been understood, measured, and adjusted, outcomes improve, and the resulting efficiencies save money and improve lives.

There are existing models for measuring social service outcomes, my favorite is; http://www.socialsolutions.com

Why our nation does not demand this software for its social service providers is a mystery to me.

The following article shows that the U.S. is not alone in its child protection troubles; Continue reading ‘How To Improve A Child Protection System’

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The Importance of DayCare, DC, LA,

Published

on March 25, 2010

. 0 Comments

The Ontario “budget cookie” (below) requesting affordable daycare I found worth repeating. Daycare allows young working families to work & have a life and their children a safe & healthy environment. Without it, parents struggle with often inadequate ways of caring for their children while they earn a living.

As a guardian ad-Litem, I have seen plenty of cases where unsavory family members and other questionable practices become the only available answer to a family that cannot find daycare.

The child pays, the family suffers, and the community bears the burden of troubles that arise as the stresses and chaos build in our neighborhoods.

The return on investment of subsidized daycare is high. Allowing parents to work, children to learn and thrive in healthy environments is what gets young kids prepared to enter school and do well. The first step in becoming a healthy citizen. Continue reading ‘The Importance of DayCare, DC, LA,’

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What Have We Come To?

Published

on March 23, 2010

in Invisible Children, Politics and Funding and Public Policy

. 0 Comments

The following article http://articles.baltimoresun.com/2010-02-23/news/bal-md.bowman23feb23_1_adoption-agency-girls-killing from the Baltimore Sun froze the blood in my arteries and brought my attention to the critical importance of funding child protection services in our communities.

Money losing newspapers are hard pressed to assign reporters to these tragic stories. As a guardian ad-Litem, I had a case with 49 police calls to a home before the children were removed (& only because the seven year old attempted to kill the five year old in front of the officer). I believe that the seven year old had been prostituted.

How can our community stand by without demanding change as three and five year old children are tortured and murdered and our overworked and underfunded social workers and institutions provide no safe place for abused youth to hide?

What follows are the sad stories of the Maryland girls, and several other tragedies that I have followed recently.
Continue reading ‘What Have We Come To?’

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The Ghost Of Christmas Future

Published

on March 17, 2010

. 0 Comments

This generation has it in for American children. By all significant indicators, U.S. youth will not be as educated, financially well off, live as long, or be as healthy as their parents. Comparing these same indicators in other developed nations the results are very different.

For many years the U.S. was a leader among the developed nations in health, quality of life, education, and mortality. Not so any more. America’s public policies have become punitive to where we now have 5% of the world’s population & 25% of its prison population & there were 13 million prison and jail releases last year alone.

Public policy makers have been satisfied building more and bigger prisons, and schizophrenic about dealing with dysfunctional families and the problems their children pose to the schools and larger community.

Any valid study of U.S. institutions shows a direct correlation between abused and neglected children, failed schools, unsafe / unhealthy communities and full prisons.

A serious look at other industrialized nations (and many emerging nations) will show that these nations do not suffer the same terrible crime problems, failing school problems, and generational poverty issues because their public policy makers have come to understand that investments in early childhood programs & support for young families are a much better investment than prisons and jails.

Some states are fighting to keep programs that protect and foster their poor and vulnerable children, but many are not.

What can be said to people that would deny health, education, and the most basic needs for the babies and young children living among them that would change their mind to a more compassionate (and practical) understanding that we all benefit when healthy children become healthy citizens?

Perhaps, remind them that all religions demand caring for the weakest and most vulnerable among them.

“When institutions are defined by what they create, instead of what they were designed to create”, it must be said that American courts and legislatures are now creating preteen moms and juvenile felons.

*(Kathleen Long, DANCING WITH DEMONS)

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Abused & Neglected Children Around The Nation

Published

on March 15, 2010

. 2 Comments

With reduced funding to manage the increased calls coming in from the community distress that results from the poverty and chaos from our declining economy, social service agencies are becoming unable to respond adequately to the calls they are receiving.

Caseloads were too high before the downturn, & funding from non profits and governmental agencies has been significantly reduced, leaving more dysfunctional families & their abused and neglected children without help.

The future holds more and bigger juvenile detention centers, jails, and prisons until this trend reverses & our communities grasp the wisdom of investing in youth.

The rest of this article is a compilation of recent updates on how states from around the nation are managing troubled families and their abused and neglected children;

Thank those of you who have sent me important articles. I appreciate the information.

Follow us on Twitter http://twitter.com/KidsAtRisk

Support KARA buy our book or donate

Become part of KARA’s email network by sending a request to join to;

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Continue reading ‘Abused & Neglected Children Around The Nation’

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Abandoning Abandoned Children

Published

Texas recently refused almost a billion dollars from the federal government to improve its school system. Texas has suffered the lowest graduation rates in the nation with the worst racial disparities.

on March 12, 2010

in education, Public Policy and The States

. 2 Comments

Not one third of Kansas City’s elementary students read at grade level.

Houston schools superintendent wrote at the time; “I have 100,000 kids in Houston who don’t read at grade level”.

Georgia education officials recently ordered investigations at 191 schools across the state where they found evidence of tampering on answer sheets for the state’s standardized achievement test.

The list of inner city schools struggling to educate the children of those who could not get to (or for reasons of loyalty, love, or ethics) decided not to, escape to the suburbs where the schools still function is long.

My old high school, Edison, built in 1922, graduates less than 50% of its students, its sister school across town has graduated less than 30% of its students for five years running.

As a nation, we know that high school dropouts have a far greater chance of preteen pregnancy, years of costly incarceration and leading dysfunctional lives that they pass on to their children (who will repeat this cycle).

25% of America’s graduating seniors are now functionally illiterate, and U.S. graduation rates are among the worst in the world.

Today, many states are increasing their percentage of spending on juvenile justice and criminal justice while maintaining or reducing spending on education.

New York and California have been spending about $250,000 per year per juvenile in their juvenile justice systems. MN has reached the half a billion dollar mark for maintaining its prison system this year after five years of double digit growth.

We are spending more on prisons than on schools and we are getting more accomplished criminals than good students.

Which is what Pliny meant when he said 2500 years ago;

“What we do to our children, they will do to our society”

Kids At Risk Action seeks information about what is happening in your community that impacts abused and neglected children.

Send us your stories.

Comment here, or privately; Info@invisiblechildren.org

Continue reading ‘Abandoning Abandoned Children’

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Abusing Children At Home & In School – The Life Of An Abused Child

Published

on March 7, 2010

in Crime and Courts, Health and Mental Health, Politics and Funding and Public Policy

. 2 Comments

Most House Republicans Vote To Allow Solitary Confinement & Restraint Devices in Schools.

The vast majority of the children we will be tying up & confining come from very troubled homes. Or, as former MN Supreme court Chief Justice Kathleen Blatz has stated, about 90% of the youth in juvenile justice have come through child protection services.

Before a child can become removed from a home through child protection services, they have lived for a long time in an abusive or neglectful home and have been tortured as defined by the World Health Organization.

It’s not the happy children that we will be restraining - it’s the three million children that are reported to child protection in America each year.

In my experience, the WHO’s definition of torture fits the life experience of a child that has been removed from an abusive home; “extended exposure to violence and deprivation” has been their life. The U.S. has no other child protection policy than the IMMINENT HARM DOCTRINE.

The link between an abused child’s past tortured life and future troubled life is clear to most of us that have lived with or worked with these damaged children long enough. It causes me great pain to see my guardian ad-Litem kids handled like mad animals (tasered, confined, beat up by under-trained staff in under-resourced detention centers) Continue reading ‘Abusing Children At Home & In School — The Life Of An Abused Child’

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Ireland Implements guardian ad-Litem Program

Published

Continue reading ‘Ireland Implements guardian ad-Litem Program’

on March 5, 2010

in International Child Abuse, Kids At Risk Action (KARA) and Public Policy

. 1 Comment

Monday’s Irish Times announced that Ireland would be

Implementing best practice on the right of children to be heard http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/ireland/2010/0301/1224265369793.html

A child’s right to be heard is the essence of the guardian ad-Litem program. Think about it. Voiceless, helpless children enduring unspeakable horrors, sometimes for many years with no one to turn to for help.

The World Health Organization defines Torture as extended exposure to violence and deprivation. That is how I see child abuse.

In my experience as a guardian ad-Litem, a child often doesn’t even know that these terrible adult behaviors are wrong or they they have not done something to cause them.

Unspeakable crimes are committed against children but its not a crime in most third world nations, and it is rarely discovered if child protection services are under-trained or under resourced in industrialized nations.

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Acting Like A Responsible Adult Part II

Published

on March 5, 2010

. 0 Comments

In the 1950′s I remember the public outrage when TV and newspapers uncovered senior citizens eating dog food out of cans and living under bridges. It was a a warm hearted, hot blooded citizen outcry that supported more social security for the aged, more health care, and more safety. Because of that outcry, politicians saw to it that support at many levels was increased to seniors.

As a volunteer guardian ad-Litem working with abused and neglected children in my county, I have watched services for at risk children disappear and the horrible results that follow. It is becoming unbearable at this time of economic unrest.

Seniors of the 1950′s were well served by the public support they received when people stood up for them at the time.

Where is that support for the millions of children reported to child protection services in this nation each year and why is it that 90% of the youth in juvenile justice have passed through child protection systems and are headed for criminal justice & U.S. preteen pregnancy and STD rates are the highest in the world?

I remember a nation that stood by its weakest and most vulnerable citizens. Where did they go?

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A Very Critical Look At Foster Care

Published

Each state must look hard at the outcomes it wants to achieve. Recent studies show that 80% of children aging out of foster care are leading dysfunctional lives

on February 28, 2010

in Invisible Children and Public Policy

. 20 Comments

The following synopsis of under-resourced foster care systems is taken from the superior reporting on the Grandparents Blog; SUNDAY,

FEBRUARY 21, 2010

A Critical Look At The Foster Care System:How Widespread a Problem?

A Critical Look At The Foster Care System:
How Widespread a Problem?
http://unhappygrammy-grandparentsblog.blogspot.com/

A New York University Survey determined that over 28% of the children in foster care had been abused while in the system. The cases noted were frightening. Louisiana a study indicated that 21% of abuse and neglect cases involved foster homes. Hundreds of Louisiana foster children were shipped to Texas.

Stephen Berzon of the Children’s Defense Fund explained the shocking findings of the court before a Congressional subcommitte, saying: “children were physically abused, handcuffed, beaten, chained, and tied up, kept in cages, and overdrugged with psychotropic medication for institutional convenience.”

The rest of this report is terrifying. Many states have decades long histories of ignoring the physical violence and overt sexual abuse of very young children. This report names names, dates, and places.

California paid $18 million to children that were abused while in its custody. This is a frightening story.

I agree with Children’s Rights Project attorney Marcia Robinson Lowry: “There are a lot of injuries, a lot of abuse. The most significant thing is the psychological death of so many of these kids. Kids are being destroyed every day, destroyed by a government-funded system set out to help them.”

There is an institutional violence done to children when the system is too busy, too under-trained, or under-resourced to include family members.
Continue reading ‘A Very Critical Look At Foster Care’

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Acting Like A Responsible Adult

Published

on February 26, 2010

in Politics and Funding, Public Policy and The States

. 4 Comments

Every state has it’s loud and mean “I got mine” Tea Party contingency, but it is prudent to look deeper into who has voted us to where we are today.

America’s aging population is retreating into retirement with its pensions and savings and leaving young families with failing schools, health systems, and communities.

The lack of financial or public support for day care, early childhood programs, schools & health care is being compounded by the increased political footballing of five year olds.

At Risk Children have been sold out to the pharmaceutical firms of our very young children as guinea pigs for Prozac, Ritalin, and other psychotropic medications (Ritalin was banned in Sweden in 1968 due to the increase in suicides).

Educators are expected to deal with the mental health issues of thousands of abused and neglected children in their classrooms each year & then be denigrated by political figures in election years.

At the same time, media & politicians are blaming the people working in the field instead of taking a constructive approach to understanding the issues and creating public policies that address the problems.

Building prisons has not worked (500M budget in MN this year), nor has under-serving abused and neglected children (double digit prison growth 4 of last 5 years).

There is nothing responsible or adult-like in accusing bad teachers for failed schools, or for blaming social workers when a baby is found in a dumpster. That is like blaming the police for the criminal in the squad car.

It is to our own best interest to approach these issues in a responsible fashion and make the investment in determining what needs to be done and then doing it.

We will continue to degrade our cities and spend far more money maintaining prisons, fighting crime, and paying for damage and insurance than we would if children received the attention they need to succeed in school and go on to lead productive lives.
The following are a few examples of the how various states are dealing with the current financial crisis and how it is impacting their public safety and children;
Continue reading ‘Acting Like A Responsible Adult’

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Books Not Yet Written

Published

Continue reading ‘Books Not Yet Written’

on February 23, 2010

in Guardian ad-Litem and Public Policy

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A Few years ago Judge Heidi Schellhas gave me a printout of the psychotropic medications the very young children in her child protection courtroom were proscribed. The impact of seven year olds on Prozac, Ritalin and other powerful medications is still with me.

How profound the impact sexual abuse, violence, and neglect has on a child (and the community that he/she will live in)

Without the right kind of care, violence and neglect hurts a child forever. The hole in their life is gigantic and small efforts don’t mend this serious damage.

What does it say about a community that leaves children in toxic homes because it does not have the foresight, concern, or resources to protect its youngest and most vulnerable citizens?

Keep in mind that Hennepin County used to be one of the nations most progressive child protection counties.

As a guardian ad-Litem there were many children in my case load that had been through three, four, and five years of the worst kinds of tortured abuse. One boy had spent much of his life tied to a bed, starved, and sexually abused (from four to seven).

He has AIDS today (about 14 years later) and not had anything like a real life. I would call it a tortured life of awful choices and no real joy.

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Children’s Health Trends

Published

on February 22, 2010

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Dr. Bruce Perry gives credible argument that 25% of Americans will be special needs people in few generations if we do not act forcefully to mend our approach to the mental health needs of abused and neglected children http://www.childtrauma.org/CTAMATERIALS/vortex_interd.asp.

Add to that the serious growing issues of diabetes that conservatively predicts that fifty percent of American’s children will be obese within three years, & that three times as many American children are proscribed psychotropic medications as are European children, is a strong indication that our public policies are not child friendly.

We are all too familiar with the sad fact that the U.S. tries 150,000 juveniles as adults each year, and that most juvenile justice cases have been child protection cases, paints an even darker picture for poor inner city children.

New York Times article on Rising Rates of Chronic Health Problems for Children;

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/23/health/research/23child.html

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Become part of KARA’s email network by sending a request to join to; amy.rostronledoux@yahoo.com

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A Modest Proposal, or If Children Could Riot

Published

Are we a community without compassion?

on February 21, 2010

in education, Guardian ad-Litem, Health and Mental Health, Politics and Funding and Public Policy

. 6 Comments

300 years ago an Irish Minister wrote a highly acclaimed critical satire (“A Modest Proposal” - in its entirety below) in protest of the cruel public policies imposed on poor families that were destroying the lives of Irish children.

Public policy at the time treated the Irish more like animals than people and their children were doomed to living lives of crime, prostitution, and destitution.

Jonathon Swift’s satirical theme was that Irish children would be better off dead than raised in such horrible and inescapable circumstances.

As a long time guardian ad-Litem, I have come to understand Swift’s rage at the cruelties a community can pile on to poor children.

The idea that America’s poor working families don’t deserve education, health care, & safe homes for their children in the richest nation in the world is a cruel and unsupportable position.

The other industrialized nations have figured out that caring for their youngest citizens guarantees healthy adults and productive communities. We now don’t rank anywhere near the top in the majority of quality of life indices among the 24 industrialized nations.

America can’t quit building prisons and filling them with juveniles and preteen moms. We continue to quit subsidizing daycare, early childhood programs, healthcare for the poor, & education funding, while at the same time listening more and more to the mean spirited philosophies of radio and TV hosts that blame the nations ills on people that have (and always will have) the least.

The economic arguments of caring for children are all in favor of creating productive citizens by early intervention and early childhood development. It actually costs a great deal more to continue to punish the weakest and most vulnerable among us.

KARA is seeking a 21st Century Modest Proposal. If you are a writer and given to challenges, please read Swift’s “Proposal” below, and write your own as you see it applying to American children & include it as a comment, or send it to Info@invisiblechildren.org
Continue reading ‘A Modest Proposal, or If Children Could Riot’

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Day Care In America, NY v MN

Published

on February 19, 2010

I argue that this policy is wasteful and immoral.

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One of my last guardian ad-Litem acts was to be part of the court proceedings to remove children from the home of a man who could not afford daycare (his wife was a crack addict).

Minnesota’s Governor had killed programs that made day care affordable for low wage earners on the pretense that the state would be fiscally better off without them.

Without subsidized daycare, this hard working man’s children would have been taken from their family, placed in foster/adoptive homes, costing the state many times as much money as daycare would have.

Add to that the disruption in the lives of these already at risk children and their likely damaged performance in school plus the all too common behavioral problems that result from this kind of chaos all add up to what we are trying to distance ourselves as a nation; more juvenile prison fodder, more preteen moms, and more dysfunctional adults.

As our former Supreme Court Chief Justice Kathleen Blatz has stated, “the difference between that poor child and a felon is about eight years”.

This Governor believes his decisions to be grounded in fiscally sound policy.

We are destroying families and costing the community both in the short term and in the long term, far more money than subsidizing of day care for low wage earners.

Presently, day care workers are paid at the same rate food service workers are in the U.S. (the lowest paid workers in the nation). This is an indication of how the nation values its young (and we still can’t afford daycare).

New York Times Article;

New York City Seeks to Close 15 Day Care Centers in Budget Cut

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Support KARA buy our book or donate

Become part of KARA’s email network by sending a request to join to; amy.rostronledoux@yahoo.com

Continue reading ‘Day Care In America, NY v MN’

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Someplace Where We Can Be A Family

Published

on February 19, 2010

Continue reading ‘Someplace Where We Can Be A Family’

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The “burden of eviction is Heavier on Black Women, Research in Milwaukee Shows” reads the New York Times today, http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/19/us/19evict.html

U of Wisconsin research shows that poor minority women are almost twice as likely to face eviction as minority men (1 of 14 vs. 1 of 25). Irresponsible behavior by live-in fathers and boyfriends and reporting domestic violence to the police often trigger evictions.

The disruption and trauma of eviction & broken homes, forces children out of schools, ruins credit ratings, creates homelessness, increased drug & alcohol abuse, violence and child abuse.

It also puts a burden on schools, increases crime, and preteen pregnancies. The cycle continues.

The costs to our community are made clear by the recent ACE study that proved that almost 70% of the serious and violent crime committed by juveniles in Ramsey County was committed by children living in 2 to 4% of Ramsey County families.

http://twitter.com/KidsAtRisk

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Civil Justice, Mental Health, Children, Education, & Politics

Published

on February 17, 2010

in Health and Mental Health, Politics and Funding and Public Policy

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Last night I attended the Patrick Henry High School Community Forum on the impact that children’s mental health has on the entire education and juvenile justice systems held by Representatives Mindy Greiling and the Civil Justice Committee Chair Joe Mullery.

Smart people from mental health and education spoke on stigma, truancy, intervention & juvenile justice. A very smart person from the community stepped forward and spoke about mental health as perceived from within the community.

By the end of the evening it was made clear that the 47,000 arrested juvenile arrests in MN last year were related to high school dropout rates and the safety of city streets. No reference was made to the A.C.E. study of two years ago indicating that over 70 percent of all violent and serious crime in Ramsey County was committed by youth from 3% of the families within the county.

Thank you to all of the committed individuals that work in education, social services, mental health and justice trying to make these institutions responsive to the massive needs within our communities.

Please appreciate the frustration from those of us who know that preteen moms and juvenile felons deserve better from our policy makers than the hard politics that have continued to underfund mental health and young families at the expense of prisons, punishment, and jails.

I am pleased that we are having public forums on the topic for more than a few reasons;

As a community, the topic has been uncomfortable and avoided for too long. Last nights discussion on “mental health” and how to be mentally “healthy” was positive and meaningful and a model for other forums and future discussions.

As a guardian ad-Litem, I came to know many traumatized children that had no access to adequate mental health services and watching them grow into dysfunctional adults has been painful. Continue reading ‘Civil Justice, Mental Health, Children, Education, & Politics’

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Health & Human Services In Minnesota (Largest Share of Budget Cuts)

Published

on February 16, 2010