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Reports and Publications :: The World According to Our Kids
Where Do We Go from Here?
This report presents a wealth of information about the world according to Arlington County youth - perhaps a very different world than
adults expected to find. What can community members conclude from all of this data? Here, we try to focus on broad patterns revealed by the survey
results and the implications of those patterns for strengthening and improving the world inhabited by our young people.
First, the Bad News: Assets Are too Low
Assets are too low and the pattern is all wrong. In an ideal world, all kids would experience 31 or more assets. In fact, only 8% of
Arlington County youth report this level.
In an ideal world, younger kids should experience high levels of external assets and that level should stay high as they gradually develop
the internal assets they need as adults. In fact, the percent of youth reporting the external assets generally falls from 6th grade to 10th
(with some modest increases between 10th and 12th that may reflect drop-outs.) And instead of seeing consistent increases in internal assets,
we see a mixed pattern ranging from strong declines (e.g., restraint) to modest increases (e.g., responsibility) but few large increases.
As the community begins to wrestle with these problems, we must recognize another clear conclusion from the data. Families do much to firm up the developmental foundation of our youth but they cannot do everything.
What can families do? Data on both risk behaviors and assets suggest that parents may be prematurely reducing their involvement in the lives of their children. Parents do need to look at how they communicate with their kids, how they set boundaries, and their involvement with school. Far fewer than half of students report these. Parents also need to look at how their role changes as their children grow older. Young people may need adults to change how they express their support but do not need it any less.
But there are limits to what families can do. Many young people already report high levels of family support. What's missing is support from the community as reflected in the low percentage of youth who report having assets like community values youth (22%) and adult role models (30%).
What is Missing from Our Kids World?
With five exceptions, less than half of Arlington County youth report having any given external asset, the assets provided by family, neighbors,
school, and community. For seven of the external assets, the results were even less satisfying with fewer than one-third of students reporting the asset.
In other words, most of our kids dont feel supported, dont feel valued or safe, lack clear boundaries, and adults seem to be too often absent from their lives.
The lack of external assets is mirrored by the lack of internal assets and the prevalence of associated risk behaviors. For example:
- Only 34% of 12th graders report family boundaries, an external asset.
Only 27% of 12th graders report the internal asset restraint with respect to the use of drugs, alcohol, and sexual activity. Half of 12th graders had used alcohol
in the 30 days leading up to the survey.
- From 6th grade to 10th grade, parent involvement in school (an external asset) falls from 39 to 24 percent. the same time, school engagement
(an internal asset reflecting whether a young person is actively engaged in learning) also declines from 58 to 47 percent. School success, a thriving measure
falls from 24 to 19 percent and school problems (a high-risk pattern) increases from 14 to 32 percent.
Both research and the discussion at the retreat suggest that young people significantly downplay the life-threatening nature of some of their behaviors.
According to the CDC, alcohol is a major factor in over half of suicides, homicides, and accidents among young people aged 15 to 24. Yet nearly half of 12th graders
report driving in a car with someone who had been drinking.
And the results of both the YRBS and Assets survey show that rates of depression and suicide attempts are higher for youth in our County than in other
communities administering the surveys. Adults in the community have a clear responsibility to respond to this information.
Any Good News? We Can Build Assets in Our Community
The good news is that we can strengthen the developmental foundation for our youth by building assets in our community. As in other
areas, the more assets that young people in Arlington have, the more likely they are to report thriving behavior and less likely to report
high risk patterns.
Assets work in a cumulative way to reduce the probabilities that our kids end up in a crisis situation. While we can never guarantee that any
individual child will thrive, we can stack the odds in their favor.
We can begin by reaching agreement that the status quo is not acceptable and by setting goals for creating a healthy community for children
and youth. The Partnership believes that a shared vision of a healthy community (including specific, measurable goals for both assets and for risk behaviors)
is essential for creating the shared effort to build assets in our homes, schools, places of worship, and meeting places. The Partnership will continue with
its efforts to build that shared vision, but ordinary citizens must be active participants in that process.
How Can We Build Assets?
With a shared vision, the community can build assets in a number of ways.
- We can start with areas of strength - family support, youth programs, religious community, and time at home. We can use these opportunities
with our youth to look for ways to build skills such as planning and decision-making and restraint.
- We can capitalize on the relatively high levels of assets reported by 6th graders in the area of commitment to learning and take steps to prevent
a downward slide as they move through middle school and enter high school. We can recognize and look for ways to counter the sophomore slump evident
from the data and affirmed by students during the retreat.
- We can and should applaud our kids for the many positive values they embody: their caring, their honesty, their integrity, and sense of responsibility,
equality and social justice and look for ways to further increase these assets.
- We can acknowledge the real strengths and abilities of young people in Arlington County and look for ways for them to make meaningful contributions
to the community.
Perhaps most important of all, we must recognize and accept that if we want honest, responsible, caring kids, we need to make sure that they have
regular and repeated contact with honest, responsible, caring adults. Without that first step, the survey results show us what to expect and that world - the
world according to our kids - is far less than they deserve.
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