Fighting For the Rights of
Children
Imagine living your life from day to day not knowing
where your next meal was going to come from or where you were going to sleep
that night. Picture yourself as an 11 year old boy or girl, constantly being
moved from foster home to foster home, and
unable to make friends due to not having anyone to speak up for your
rights. Most people want to complain about the hardships the children in foster
care face, but are unwilling to stand up for them. Are you that person, or are
you willing to stand up and be a voice for the children? If so, you should
think about becoming a “Child Advocate”. Take the stand and become a voice for
the child who otherwise has none!
Every day we see it, either in the supermarket or the
drugstore or even just walking down the street. There is that one child who you
see that makes you ask yourself, does this child have proper care at home? Does
he/she have enough to eat? Is he/she abused in their home environment? One out
of five children will die due to abuse or neglect (Author, Unknown, 2012, www.nationalchilrensalliance.org).
In 2010, an estimated 1,560 children died from neglect or abuse in the United
States alone (Every Child Matters Education Fund, We Can Do Better:
Child Abuse and Neglect Death in the U.S., 2009).
You see this child and while you may feel sorry for
him/her, you walk away and often times don’t give them another thought. How can
you help? Become a Child Advocate. A child advocate is a person who promotes
the optimal development of a child, or group of children (Author, Unknown, www.dicitionary.com,
2009). As a child advocate, you typically would represent or give voice to an
individual child or group of children whose concerns and interests are not
being heard. You would be responsible also for trying to prevent children from
being harmed or seeking justice for those who already have been harmed or
worse; you might find yourself fighting for justice of a child who has died due
to neglect and/or abuse. While acting as a Child Advocate, you may be
responsible for ensuring that children have access to positive influences or
services that benefit their lives such as education, childcare, and parenting.
Thanks to the ones who are willing to stand up for
children, in 2010, Children’s Advocacy Center’s around the country served over 266,000 victims of abuse,
providing support not only to the children but to their families as well. In
2011, that number had grown by 27 percent to 279,000 (Arthur, Unknown, U.S.
Department of Health and Human Services: Administration for Children &
Families, Child Maltreatment, 2010). According to the National Children’s
Alliance, national statistics for 2010 and 2011, collected from Children’s Advocacy
Center members, children younger than
one year of age had the highest rate of victimization with 20.6 percent of 1000
children in the population of the same age.
Nearly 80 percent of reported child fatalities were a
result of abuse or neglect that was caused by one or more of the child’s
parents. With rates this high, how can we continue to not do something? Our
children are the gateway to our future, how can you sit by and do nothing to
protect them? Please, contact your local Child Advocacy Center and learn how
you can become a part of helping our country to become great once again. Don’t
wait, you never know, it could be too late.
References
Every
Child Matters Education Fund, We Can Do Better: Child Abuse and Neglect Deaths
in the U.S. http://www.everychildmatters.org/storage/documents/pdf/reports/wcdbv2.pdf
National Children’s Alliance, Children’s Advocacy
Center Members, 2010
U.S.
Department of Health and Human Services: Administration for Children &
Families, Child Maltreatment 2010, http://www.acf.hhs.gov/programs/cb/pubs/cm10/cm10.pdf
National Children’s Alliance,
Children’s Advocacy Center Members, 2010
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