Where is home? And how do we find it? During the summer of 2000, Kenny wanders about seeking answers to these fundamental questions while sleeping homeless in forests at night and working as a professional naturalist during the daylight hours. Along the way he meets weird characters, has bizarre conversations in the YWCO hot tub, encounters the Keepers of Beauty, plasters Athens, Georgia with free Post It Poetry and gains deep philosophical insight and inspiration from a brick mason living in his van. Ironically, to discover where he truly belongs and find his place in the wider world he had to become a Young Homeless Professional.
Adolescent homelessness is a growing problem that results in a variety of health challenges. This text is a practical resource designed to promote effective interdisciplinary health and social care interventions targeting adolescents who are homeless or at risk for homelessness. It is based on extensive interdisciplinary experience, reviews of pertinent research and insights and contributions of leading professionals who are directly involved in the care of these young people. Divided into four main sections, Section 1: (Chapters 1-7) section one is a review of the structure and professional involvement of program models targeting youth experiencing or at risk for homelessness to encourage broader understanding and utilization of principles and practices underlying effective programs and identify replicable components. Section 2: (Chapters 8-16) Section two is clinically focused with recommendations for working with adolescents and youth experiencing homelessness and interventions for common and significant medical and mental health conditions, and substance use disorders. Section 3: (Chapter 17) Reviews international agreements regarding stabilization and care of refugee youth and families, description of experiences of refugee children and youth in developed countries, and an outline of conditions from which refugee youth and families have left. Section 4: (Chapters 18 and 19) Engagement of homeless youth in research and future research directions to address needs of youth experiencing homelessness. Written by experts from a variety of disciplines, Clinical Care for Homeless, Runaway and Refugee Youth is a first of its kind text for physicians, social workers, public health workers and any other individual that works directly with these vulnerable populations.
There have always been homeless people in the United States, but their plight has only recently stirred widespread public reaction and concern. Part of this new recognition stems from the problem's prevalence: the number of homeless individuals, while hard to pin down exactly, is rising. In light of this, Congress asked the Institute of Medicine to find out whether existing health care programs were ignoring the homeless or delivering care to them inefficiently. This book is the report prepared by a committee of experts who examined these problems through visits to city slums and impoverished rural areas, and through an analysis of papers written by leading scholars in the field.
Young homeless people are ordinary young people trapped in an extraordinary situation. This accessible guide provides information and advice on how to understand the needs of these young people, and how to ensure they are supported effectively. It combines the latest research and practice to establish what works best when helping young homeless people and provides insights into their world through diary excerpts and interviews. Key issues covered include the relationship between drug and alcohol misuse and youth homelessness, current policies on housing and support for homeless youths and strategies for renewing a young person's familial bonds and friendships after an experience of homelessness. This book is an invaluable guide for anyone working with young homeless people, including youth workers, counsellors, social workers, residential care staff, teachers, health visitors and managers in the housing, education, health and social welfare sectors.
The number of homeless families in the United States continues to increase at an alarming rate. There is little doubt that becoming homeless and living in shelters has had significant effects on the lives of the children in these families. While many empirical studies have documented the effects of homelessness on one or another aspect of children's lives, Moving To Nowhere looks at the experience of losing one's home and living in a shelter from the perspective of the child. Children who are homeless tell their own story. They speak of life in a shelter as they have known it. It is through these stories that human service professionals can come to see homelessness as the children themselves see it and can learn what living in a shelter is like. Children who are homeless tell their own story. They describe how they became homeless, why they think it happened to their family, what their expectations and concerns were as they realized they would be moving to a shelter, and what the shelter was like when they arrived. They speak often of missing their old neighborhoods, their friends, and their extended family. They report their fears, their worries about their family's future, the absence of money and resources, and, for some, the presence of violence or substance abuse in their families. They repeatedly tell of their embarrassment about being homeless; this profoundly colors their relationships to friends, schoolmates, and teachers. And, in each of their stories, these children provide clear and moving examples of how they manage to survive on a day to day basis while they wait for permanent housing. Health care professionals, psychologists, and teachers, as well as students and the general public, will find this work poignant and instructive.
Being Young and Homeless is an intimate portrayal of life on the street from the perspective of young people in Toronto, Montreal, Halifax, and Guatemala City. Jeff Karabanow passionately portrays street youth experiences in various locales, highlighting reasons for entering street life, struggles to survive on the street, encounters with service providers, and for some, the street exiting process. This insightful book is relevant for students and practitioners of social work, sociology, social administration, and public policy.
This straightforward reference surveys the knowledge base on homeless, runaway, and thrown-away children and adolescents and makes concrete recommendations for policy and practice. It is a comprehensive volume, that covers new state legislation in the U.S. dealing with runaway and homeless youth. The book’s ecological approach grounds readers in the demographics of this diverse population, family and other risk factors for leaving home (and alternative arrangements such as foster care), and the survival skills homeless young people use to sustain themselves. Chapters cover a gamut of physical, psychological, and social problems, from drug abuse to depression to STIs, with special attention paid to the multiple difficulties faced by LGBT street youth and street youths’ experiences with the legal and justice systems. The author also assesses established and emerging interventions used with runaway youth, and the effectiveness of policy initiatives dealing with improving conditions for youth on the streets and at risk. Included in the coverage: · Runaway youth at the time of their disappearance. · Food insecurity and related problems among homeless and runaway youth. · Substance use among homeless and runaway adolescents. · Runaway and homeless sexual minorities. · Court responses to runaway offenses and other juvenile status violations. · Street youth in different countries. Presenting the complex situation as it stands, and with clear suggestions for action, Runaway and Homeless Youth is a valuable resource for family therapists, sociologists, social workers, school administrators, health professionals, police, judges, and other criminal justice professional, along with professionals involved in young people’s well-being and policy-making initiatives.
Young and Homeless in Hollywood examines the social and spacial dynamics that contributed to the construction of a new social imaginary--"homeless youth"--in the United States during a period of accelerated modernization from the mid 1970s to the 1990s. Susan Ruddick draws from a range of theoretical frameworks and empirical treatments that deal with the relationship between placemaking and the politics of social identity.
This is one of the first books to focus on child homelessness in the context of school social work and related professional practice. Beginning with ways to think about homelessness, the book guides the reader through the important studies and findings as they relate to school social workers and other related professionals. It provides readers with a detailed and thoughtful description of important policies that shape practice with homeless students and offers guidance on assessing perceived policy implementation.
