Summer! You can almost hear the teens squealing with delight at the thought of no school and no responsibilities. It is an excellent time for your child to rest and recover from the regimented school schedule. However, parents need to guard against boredom. Summer can be a risky time for teens as well. Teens with more downtime run a higher
Read moreEveryone can agree that school is important for youth. But what about extracurricular activities? Is football really making a difference in a young man’s life? Is playing in a band something nice for an adolescent or something more? Is going to the local community center really good for my child? After-school programs and extracurricular activities can offer youth a safe
Read moreThe school bell rings and adolescents rejoice! Whether it’s Winter or Spring Break, teenagers are thrilled to have a little free time! Not all parents rejoice, however. Working parents are concerned about unsupervised time. Parents in the home are dreading the constant requests to go places and do things, the fighting among siblings, or the whining about nothing to do or
Read moreAs adults, when we look at the adolescent who rolls their eyes when asked to mow the lawn or procrastinates over cleaning their room, the idea of this same teen volunteering in the community seems laughable. The joke may be on you, because teen volunteerism is on the rise. A recent report from Independent Sector showed that about 13 million
Read moreWas your first question when you saw this headline “what is out-of-school time?” The National Institute on Out-of-School Time (www.niost.org) reported: “In the hours after the school bell rings, violent juvenile crime soars and the prime time for juvenile crime begins. The peak hours for such crime are from 3:00 to 6:00 PM. These are also the hours when children
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