In the context of alternative care and institutionalisation, it is important to take a moment to consider International Youth Day, and not just because a lot of teenagers are growing up in institutions. They are, and it is significant, and we will get to that, but there is more.
Youths, teenagers, are not just young people that have been placed in an institution, that have been trafficked, that have been sold for sexual exploitation. They are not just those that things are done to. They are not just victims. They are also those who step up.
Youths are the ones taking care of younger siblings in the tens of thousands of child-headed households. When their parents passed away or disappeared and there were no other relatives were around to take care of the children, youths, sometimes as young as 13, 14 years old, stepped up and took charge. They do what needs to be done to make sure their family does not end up on the streets, to make sure the siblings do not get separated and they make sure everyone gets fed and goes to school. They put aside their own youth and take up parenthood, to allow their siblings to be able to enjoy their childhood and youth.
Similarly, in many institutions, where there is a lack of staff and where children of all ages live together, teenagers usually step up and help younger children. They become the de facto caregivers of the younger children, the ones those children feel they can depend on more than on the adults. Even while the teenagers themselves have no one to look after them, to guide them and comfort them, they still do what they can for others.
Youths deserve our support. When they are the head of a household, there needs to be a mentor available for them in the community, as well as financial support, to make sure that the teenager has someone to ask for help, someone to confide in and someone to tell them they are doing a great job. When they are in institutions, they, like younger children, should be given a chance to be reunited with their own family or to become part of a new family.
Plus, there is a part of family-based care that not everyone is aware of, that is particularly there for youths: supported living. Often teenagers of 16 years and older find it hard to adjust to life in a family if they have been institutionalised for a long time, or to accept joining a new family if they cannot stay in their own. In these cases, it is useful to have a supported living programme in place.
This is a programme where small groups of teenagers aged 16 and over live together within the community, under the guidance of a mentor, who lives with them or who visits often. The mentor is usually a young adult, relatively close in age to the teenagers, who does know how to look after him or herself in the community. This mentor’s job is not to look after and care for the teenagers, but to help the teenagers and young adults learn to look after themselves in the community.
This gives youths the opportunity to learn how to become independent and deal with all aspects of adult life, preparing them for when it is time for them to go out into the world on their own.
Let’s give a hand to youths. Both in the sense of giving them applause for all they are doing and accomplishing against all the odds, and in the sense of providing them with the support needed to help them on their way.
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