Growing Up in B.C – Challenges Remain
Victoria B.C. – While there have been some positive gains for the most vulnerable children and youth in B.C. a new report from the Representative for Children and Youth and the Provincial Health Officer says children continue to struggle in a number of areas.The report “Growing Up in B.C. – 2015 ” is a follow up report to a similar report released five years ago. It finds that, while there have been some improvements for children overall, children and youth in care continue to struggle when it comes to education, physical and mental health, family economic well-being, safety, behaviour, and making and maintaining important family, peer and community connections.
“With the passage of five years since the last report are we able to report improvement? The short answer is ‘no’,” says Mary Ellen Turpel-Lafond, the Representative for Children and Youth. “While there are some positive findings overall, serious gaps in well-being remain. These children start out behind their peers and stay behind. This is most true for young people and their families with multiple, intersecting vulnerabilities.”
Provincial Health Officer Perry Kendall says there is some good news, “While the report shows some promising trends in declining teen pregnancy rates, rates of smoking during pregnancy and serious criminal activity, there are some findings that are of great concern. This report shines a light on what needs to be focused on to better support B.C.’s youth – especially Aboriginal youth and children in care.”
Among the positive changes:
• The number of Aboriginal students graduating from high school within six years increased to nearly 60 per cent – a 13 per cent improvement
• Teenage pregnancy rates declined
• 80 per cent of youth say they usually feel good about themselves
• Youth involvement in serious crime declined.
However, some findings in the report are worrisome:
• About one-third of children entering Kindergarten are not as ready as they should be for school
• Aboriginal children and youth are 12 times more likely than non-Aboriginal children and youth to be in government care
• Children in government care are five times more likely than the general population to be designated as having a special education need
• Almost 60 per cent of youth in care do not graduate from high school within six years
• Half of youth who age out of care when they turn 19 are on income assistance within six months of leaving care.
Poverty remains a key issue says Turpel-Lafond “Since the onset of the recession in 2008, the number of children living in families with incomes below the poverty line increased to one in five, with very little progress in recent years to improve that. This report demonstrates, once again, the need for a cross-ministry children’s plan in B.C. to close the gaps, planning for targeted investments where they are needed most.”
Both Kendall and Turpel -Lafond call for improved data from both the Provincial and Federal Governments in order to better track what is going on .”The importance of having accessible data to measure outcomes and guide policy cannot be understated,” says Kendall “In 2011, the federal government went against the advice of experts and chose to discontinue the mandatory long-form census. As a result, we have lost a critically important source of information, specifically about the more marginalized populations who are under-represented in voluntary surveys.”
Comments
Ending the long form census only works for a government bent on pulling the wool over the eyes of the electorate . Wool hats for all the harperettes , they love the dark side . Bigotry also leans right , why is that ? And when did progressive become a bad thing ?
Ataloss; “Bigotry also leans right , why is that ? ” ??? Bigotry, racism, small mindness & intolerance of others view points doesn’t follow cultural boundaries let alone political boundaries. As has been extremely evident on this blog & others, the moment a person expresses a dissenting opinion from the flavour of the moment, no matter how well written or reasoned, the political correct left immediately jumps to name calling & labelling. Is this not bigotry? Try to respond without the seeming pre-requisite branding that pervades those whose political leanings are left of centre.
Also, the point of the article is to show the progress that has been made. Is that not a good thing? Rather than dwell on the negative, try to see that, while far from perfect, we still have the privilege of living in a pretty (literally) damn great place.
Don’t feed the troll. Notice how she has given up any pretense of that snotty, holier than thou attitude, and now all her posts are simply sophmorish attempts to get a rise from the intelligent commenters?
The progressives on this site have been schooled during this park name change, topic. Next.
Detoe44 when reading an article have you ever noticed the the last paragraph is usually where the message of the article is or some call it the hook . So read the last paragraph over again . Perhaps you will understand it a bit better .
What makes you think I am a woman jimmy ? Does that make you feel better about denigrating how I feel thinking of me as a woman ? You seem to have more issues than national geographic . Progress is a bad thing , really ?
Ataloss, my reading & comprehension are fine. I read the whole article, reread my second post. Oh, thank you for confirming my 1st post, I forgot to add dripping condescension to the list.
Jimmy Hughes, just curious, what does your referral to “The progressives on this site have been schooled during this park name change, topic” go to do with this article? I have read this article may times and I don’t see the connection? care to clue in a blind man?
detoe44 states; “Bigotry, racism, small mindness & intolerance of others view points doesn’t follow cultural boundaries let alone political boundaries.” Not to insult your intelligence detoe44, firstly; the correct word is mindedness not “mindness”, secondly; view points is one word “viewpoints” not two words.
Thirdly; bigotry, racism, small mindedness and intolerance ARE linked to low IQ and Conservative beliefs.
www. livescience.com/18132-intelligence-social-conservatism-racism.html
This comment will probably be removed by the site moderator, but I thought I would at least try and offer direct evidence that refutes your ignorance based beliefs.
Good link Sophic . The trouble with it is that few if any of our bigots will ever read it and as the article illustrates , they wouldn’t understand what they are reading anyway . There’s no lifeguard in the gene pool . The next step in our evolution is already here . So there is hope .
The other evidence can of course be seen in the comment section of today’s Bill Phillips editorial; most every person who is against the park renaming are right leaning conservatives, while most every person who is in favour of the renaming are politically left leaning.
However, we digress from the original subject; while a little progress has been made for children in care, we are far from getting where we should be with respect to quality and level of care indicators. Interesting that the Children’s advocate would call for more “evidence” based performance indicators, while the righties abhor science and evidence based decision making. This is an underlying characteristic of the right wing ideologues, ignore facts and truths if they get in the way of their faith based beliefs. So tell us again why Canada’s scientific community has been muzzeled, tell us why the long form census was scrapped?
Sophic; “Not to insult your intelligence detoe44,”…But I’ll try anyway. Thank you also for proving what I wrote in my 1st post. The new age of leftism cannot hold a quasi- intelligent discussion without reverting to name calling, insults & outright bigotry. I stick to my view point, bigotry, racism, small mindness & intolerance know no boundaries. Your current post along with many others you have written proves me out…or if your link to yet another left wing site that only prints articles that promote it’s belief is true, you must be a closet Conservative.
Oh, Sophic, the word you are searching for is “muzzled”, not muzzeled. ;)
I type 40 words per minute, sometimes my finger might hit one a letter key by mistake.
So tell me how is a scientific site called “livescience”… left leaning? Science follows the evidence no matter where it leads, and does not have anything to do with politics… go figure your reaction would be denial based when presented with direct evidence that low IQ and Conservative beliefs are indicative characteristics of racism.
Looks like changing the name of Fort George Park really wasn’t a game changer, eh bleeding heart Libs?
Ah Sophic, with every post you dig yourself deeper. You just cannot resist attempted insults no matter how clever you believe yourself to be. Where in any post on this site have I ever represented myself as a Conservative? Quite the opposite, yet because my point of view doesn’t match up to your small world view I must be “the enemy”. As to your question on how a “scientific site” cannot have political leanings? I cannot believe you are really that naive. I have read several articles on the basis of racism, some do go as far as to name a political bent as to where racism originates but very few would go out on a limb & say that racism is a conservative trait, rather conservatism at it’s extremes would attract people of a racist nature. Get out, see the world & you will see what I am talking about. You will see bigotry, racism & discrimination in all walks of life. Your ramblings come across as unschooled, untraveled & sophomoric in nature.
“Hodson and Busseri (2012) found in a correlational study that lower intelligence in childhood is predictive of greater racism in adulthood, with this effect being mediated (partially explained) through conservative ideology. They also found poor abstract reasoning skills were related to homophobic attitudes which was mediated through authoritarianism and low levels of intergroup contact.”
www. psychologytoday.com/blog/millennial-media/201304/do-racism-conservatism-and-low-iq-go-hand-in-hand
“There’s no gentle way to put it: People who give in to racism and prejudice may simply be dumb…Low-intelligence adults tend to gravitate toward socially conservative ideologies. Those ideologies, in turn, stress hierarchy and resistance to change, attitudes that can contribute to prejudice.”
Did anyone get the “resistance to change” part of the above quoted January 2012 article in the Journal Live Science? I did not carelessly make reference to the people who are against the park name “change” as being primarily Conservative right leaning, and those in favour of the name change being politically left leaning. I made that reference, in my earlier comment, because evidence exists that the conservative right are more resistant to “change”.
This is fascinating stuff, if you really think about it. I love science because it has so much to do with the discovery of facts and truths. :-)
With the stunning arrogance of calling him or herself a ‘sophic sage’, and contributing such gems as: ‘Low-intelligence adults tend to gravitate toward socially conservative ideologies’ the poster reveals him or herself as someone that clearly doesn’t understand the real world.
There is nothing in the current debate about park name changes, or social outcomes for children that suggests racism, or that the conservative point of view is of ‘low intelligence’. The figures released today show that aboriginals make up 8% of the child population of this province, yet represent more than 50% of the children in state care. Those are the numbers.
The underlying reason for the overwhelming bias in the data is poor parental care, including absenteeism, abuse and neglect. Those are the numbers.
That’s a huge problem that needs to be addressed by the province, of course, because it’s a grave social ill. But first and foremost the problem must be addressed by the leadership of the various First Nations in this province.
And SS – I can guarantee that my level of education is higher than yours in scientific and applied scientific fields that really matter. Your Cracker Jack box MA in Holistic Spirit Field Analysis doesn’t impress anyone on this blog.
As usual People Firs…uh I mean Sophic, picks & chooses which parts of the article she quotes to illustrate her point. From the article she is using as “empirical truth” that a person who holds conservative views is both racist & below average intelligence; “A study of averages
” Hodson was quick to note that the despite the link found between low intelligence and social conservatism, the researchers aren’t implying that all liberals are brilliant and all conservatives stupid. The research is a study of averages over large groups, he said.
“There are multiple examples of very bright conservatives and not-so-bright liberals, and many examples of very principled conservatives and very intolerant liberals,” Hodson said.”
Did anyone get the “link” that Hodson referred to? Fascinating stuff links & hypothesis because although compelling & thought provoking, they are not facts or truth, but rather someone’s viewpoint that could be disproven at any time.
VOR states; “The underlying reason for the overwhelming bias in the data is poor parental care, including absenteeism, abuse and neglect. Those are the numbers.” Oh so close VOR, but what is the primary underlying reason/cause for them having poor parental care, absenteeism, abuse and neglect in the first place? The answer has two words; the first word starts with an “R” and the second word starts with an “S”, perhaps Bill Poser can help you out with this one, if you ask him nicely.
@ detoe44; point taken, I will rephrase my comment:
“On Average”; racism, conservatism, and low IQ, go hand-in-hand.
Is that better? You made me qualify my statement with the words “on average”.
Too generous Sophic . Racism in deed does lean right . The more racist , the farther right .
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