Roberta Phillip Robbins, A Youth And A Gang Violence Prevention Specialist For Multnomah County Essay

The lives of children are greatly influenced by the environment they grow up in, and the people they come in contact with. For years, psychologists, researchers, and social workers have studied children, and why they do what they do. All have developed many different perspectives on how to view social problems and the development of individuals.

In the article “Can Violent Criminals Help Troubled Teens?” By Kristin Lewis was it a good idea or bad idea that teens spend a day learning in a jail cell. To start with, people think that it was a bad idea to sent teens to learn and spend a day with prisoners from jail. As a result, “teens shouldn't’t stay a day at a prison to learn because some prisoner did something mean to Sahn and teens wouldn't’t want that to happen to them.” Also, the teens would get sick, hurt or embarrass. Furthermore, “teens don’t want to be taunted, harassed and intimidated by the prisoners that are behind bars.” To emphasize, a prisoner would be executed and that is not pretty for teens to see. For this reason, “teens are taken to the death row, where nearly 700

It was estimated that if the corporate welfare dollars were distributed to the poorest 10% of United States families, homes would receive an additional $47,000 dollars annually (Huff, 1993). Another concept that resonated with me what the government spending for corporate welfare in the 80’s. There was a great deal of spending even in the 80’s to various expenditures and subsidized services, there was 181 billion dollars spent (Huff, 1993). It was shocking to think of how much was spent and where the cuts were made. It seems there are some type of flaws and changed that could have been made to make a difference in this gap. The concepts will contribute to my practice because I now know how far these issues date back and where the problems in the system

What ever happened to kids wanting saying they wanted to be a police officer, fireman, doctor or teacher when they grow up? Does anyone ever say, when I grow up I want to be in a gang? According to the National Gang Threat Assessment there are over one million gang members in California and over forty percent are under the age of eighteen. Just in Fresno alone there are over twelve thousand gang members and over 500 gangs (Overend). Gang violence is a growing problem and if we don’t try to control it now it will be a bigger problem in the future.

Poverty is present in today’s U.S. social system. For example, as Lesser states in the Clearinghouse Review, “Forty-six million Americans live in poverty” (1). Lesser then goes on to say how forty-six million Americans living in poverty correlates to almost one in every three single-parent families is poor (1). This is a daunting fact as it applies to today’s economic context with “rising unemployment rates and mortgage crises driving more individuals and families to seek the support of a cash-strapped social welfare structure” (Grijalva 1). With this in mind, many legislators are discussing the topic of poverty in the political realm. In order to tally the score of representatives the Sargent Shriver National Center on Poverty Law conducted its sixth annual Poverty Scorecard. “The 2012 Poverty Scorecard grades the voting record of every U.S. senator and representative on the most important poverty-related votes in 2012” (Lesser 1). The 2012 votes covered a range of topics such as budget and tax, food and nutrition, health care, housing, and many more (1). The results of the 2012 Poverty

Although most American citizens do not typically notice government programs in their daily lives, implemented policies have major effects on American citizens. It is estimated that around 1.35 million children suffer from homelessness due to their families living on the streets (Crook). With this massive housing conundrum, the United States government should increase funding for the McKinney-Vento Homeless Assistance Act. Increased funding would decrease homelessness by lowering the crime rate, educating students, and improving American living conditions.

As humans we strive to live in a utopian environment, free of elements of aggression, greed, and violence. Most of us try to live a healthy and satisfying life, gaining from opportunities that we have sought and worked hard for. We take life as it comes, and we accept the challenges and difficulties that life puts out as we continue on no matter how hard it gets. However, there are a multitude of people who tend to think that life is just too hard and that they should be handed everything on a silver platter. Greed and violence begin to factor into their life as they continue in their set ways. They think that the world should revolve around their every need and that life is unbearably hard and unjustly unfair. These

Youth gang violence has turned into an unmistakable issue in the public eye reaching across national boundaries as well as socio-economic, cultural, racial, and class distinctions. Not only is the problem widely dispersed geographically, but its incidence is also extensive, making it a common, acknowledged, and a mainstream behavior for many teens. Gang activity is extremely common in lower income neighborhoods and ethnic ghettos where underprivileged children are regularly recruited. Youth gang violence has always been an issue in the United States since the 1950’s but many crime analysts tended to overlook the problem of youth gang violence in major cities due to historical events such as the Korean War, U.S. Supreme Court ruled segregation was illegal in the Brown v. Board of Education decision, and the Civil Rights Movement. The first nationwide study undertaken of the nature and extent of gang violence was reported by Walter B. Miller. Miller whose study concentrated primarily on the increase of gang violence and four major motives such as respect, guarding local communities, control, and gain the of monetary goods.

Gangs have had a huge impact in Oklahoma the many years they have been here. Gangs account for most of the drug trade, as well as most of the homicides in the Oklahoma area. Gangs are being fueled by the fear they have given the citizens, therefore most people are too afraid to do anything about the problem. “Every city in the world always has a gang, a street gang, or the so-called outcasts”.- Jimi Hendrix.

Kenia Calderon has been an active leader since 2013, when she became vocal about her lack of legal status to improve the lives of the undocumented youth in Des Moines. Over the last four years, she has met undocumented high schoolers to motivate and guide them as they navigate the higher education system. Her fight for civil rights include fighting for low income families to have access financial institutions, access to higher education, and standing with street vendors as they fought for their rights at the city level. Kenia has lobbied for different causes that affect the most vulnerable in our city. She lobbied for credit unions to not be regulated like banks because these financial institutions have efforts around serving the unbanked

There have been many approaches taken to get rid of gang violence from the streets of Toronto. Whether it be by having tougher law's or taking guns off the street, very few methods have yet to be effective. When it comes to looking at a complex situation such as gang violence there are many factors that affect the reasons as to why people join gangs in the first place.Whether it is due to poverty, peer pressure, boredom or despair (Grabianowski). Gang violence can never be fully gotten rid of due to the fact that there will always be people who commit crimes whether it be just an individual or a group of people, however we can reduce the amount of people who choose to choose that pathway in their life.One of the most effective ways of getting rid of gang violence off the streets of Toronto is by having more activities provided for the youth in the communities with higher gang related crime rates.

Toward the end of the 2015 meeting of the Indiana General Assembly (“Session”), it became evident that a few advocacy organizations were seemingly misinformed and disconnected from IHCDA policy positions. Rather than addressing these issues individually, IHCDA seized the opportunity to develop a much broader working group of advocates and experts that are connected to housing and community development in Indiana. After receiving strong support and encouragement from several organizations, IHCDA formally organized the oracle of advocates and industry experts dubbing it the Indiana Housing and Community Development Coalition (‘Coalition”).

Gangs are nothing new to American society, what is new and disturbing is the recent spike in juvenile crimes with reported ties to certain gangs. Youth gangs have been prevalent in schools in large cities since the 1970 's. However, they have become even more prevalent in schools in the recent past. In the student survey component of the 1995 National Crime Victimization Survey, more than one third (37%) of the students reported gangs at their schools and the percentage of students reporting the presence of gangs at their schools nearly doubled between 1989 and 1995, and then decreased in 1999, according to a more conservative measure.

Within the past two decades, a growing concern has been focused on what can be considered a social epidemic among the youth of our nation. This social distress stems directly from the rising number of youth gangs throughout the country. Gang mentality and social deviance of this form has been noticed and documented in this country for decades. “ Prior to the 1970’s, gang violence was still popularly associated with white ethnic enclaves in the cities of the Midwest and East, and gang incidents were typically brawls involving fists, sticks and knives. Today, gangs are made up largely of ethnic groups, especially African American and Latino Americans, and handguns and other military hardware are the typical vehicles for the acts of

The lack of affordable housing in the United States is a problem that doesn 't receive nearly the attention that it necessitates. This absence of affordable housing became especially prevalent following World War II when suburbanization spread across the country like wildfire. Although the sheer number of homes increased, Jim Crow segregation influenced housing policy, meaning that white institutions prevented blacks from obtaining the mortgages needed to afford such homes. Therefore, rather than accept subprime loans, which often result in foreclosure, many black people have been pigeonholed into paying exorbitant rates for dilapidated rental properties located in inner-cities, thereby creating the affordable housing problem. Although the situation seems bleak, with careful planning and execution, we can solve the affordable housing problem. Specifically, my proposal involves the following two components: the government must first revise and draft three forms of legislation that create strict yet concise standards that landlords must follow, and then allocate federal funding to health and wellness programs within poor communities. By examining the contributing societal factors to the lack of affordable housing in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, and then implementing the proposal mentioned above, one could potentially solve the affordable housing problem there and transpose the plan to other impoverished cities across the country.