JUVENILE DELINQUENCY SINCE 1948 the volume and the rate of juvenile delinquency have shown a steady increase in the United States. About a half million children are now being referred to the juvenile courts of the nation each year. A 70-percent increase took place in the number of cases reported between 1948 and 1955. During this same period the child population (7 to 17 years) increased 16 percent. The rate of increase of juvenile delinquency has exceeded by more than four times the rate of population increase. If this trend continues, more than a million youngsters can be anticipated in the juvenile courts in the near future. These are not "just court statistics." These are children. They have names, parents, and teachers. Their natural habitat is the Classroom, U. S. A. But not all children, nor even a majority of children, are delinquent. Only about 2 percent of the children aged 7 to 17 have a court contact in any one year. Although the volume of delinquency country-wide is substantial, the actual number of cases that a classroom teacher may expect to find within his own class or classes will be small. However, the teacher's contacts with predelinquents may be considerable. If the present trends continue, it is likely that perhaps 1 boy in 5 will show a delinquency record by the time he reaches draft age. Far more boys than girls commit offenses which bring them to the attention of the courts. In 1952 the ratio was 5 boys to 1 girl. The anticipated ratios of delinquency vary from neighborhood to neighborhood and from community to community. In overcrowded, deteriorating, and neglected neighborhoods where social disorganization, rulelessness, and contradictory value systems are common, the schools can expect larger numbers and higher percentages of delinquents in their classrooms than can be expected in schools more favorably situated. Just how bad is the misbehavior picture as seen through the eyes of teachers? Judging from the questionnaire returns of more than four thousand teachers as reported by the NEA Research Division, the problem of misbehavior and delinquency is not nearly as bad as is frequently portrayed on the TV screen, in the movies, in the press, and on the radio-at least so said the teachers. For example, two-thirds of the teachers responding indicated that "real trouble makers" account for fewer than 1 in every 100 pupils. Almost 95 percent of the teachers described their pupils as either exceptionally well behaved or reasonably well behaved. However, this broad opinion survey gives no whitewash of the youth problem. Teachers working in the largest cities reported a heavy incidence of physical attack against faculty members in their schools. Twenty-eight percent of the teachers indicated that such an incident took place within the 12-month period, and only 23 percent of these teachers from the largest communities said that their pupils were exceptionally well behaved. These respondents also reported that the most troublesome and turbulent grades are to be found in the junior high school with the senior high school second, and the elementary school least affected. This study implies that "bigness" courts trouble. Teachers in the largest communities, in the largest schools, and who had the largest classes reported significantly more trouble with pupils than did instructors working in less crowded districts, in smaller schools, and in smaller classes. It may well be that "bigness" breeds anonymity and an impersonality of relationship that seriously affects the quality of classroom learning and behavior. NEEDED: A POSITIVE ATTITUDE TOWARD Within the array of deviate or exceptional children, the juvenile delinquent is low man on the totem pole of school-community acceptance. Studies indicate that most teachers, if they had a choice, would prefer not to work with the overt, aggressive, antisocial deviate. The juvenile delinquent is a child generally full of hate and hostility; the nature of his difficulty, as evidenced by his overt aggressiveness, is such as to elicit little sympathy from an offended and irritated community. The result is that the hostile delinquent is met with equal hate and hostility on the part of the community. There is little hope or promise in ultimate adjustment for the 41638 0-59- -22 delinquent or any lessening of the youth problem for the community on this two-way street of hate and hostility. Operating on the principle that the delinquent is first a child and secondly a delinquent, that he is seldom delinquent 24 hours a day and for a full seven-day week, and that there is no such thing as human rubbish, all professional workers, including classroom teachers, must distinguish between the sin and the sinner. Rejecting the delinquency, the worker should not reject the delinquent. Yet there is considerable evidence available that the public and even some professional workers are not so much attacking juvenile delinquency as they are attacking the delinquent himself. If not attacking the delinquent, the press and public opinion have opened up a sharp attack against his parents and even against many professional workers who are hired to help the young offender. These attacks can be seen in the rash of antiparent legislation enacted in many states, and in the "get tough with parents" attitudes visible in most communities, together with the periodic waves of criticism leveled against “soft” courts, "muddleheaded psychiatrists," and "egghead researchers" who undertake to study and work with the nonconforming child. It is very easy to become indignant and irate with the offending behavior of the delinquent; it is hard to refrain from striking back at the delinquent and his neglectful or lackadaisical parents. Unlike the deaf child, the blind child, or the polio victim with his heavy leg brace, the delinquent evokes little empathy or positive action that promises help. Like a behavioral alcoholic he needs sympathy, study, and treatment rather than jailing. Instead of a helping hand, the delinquent gets the back of the community's hand. Like any nondelinquent, the young offender is much in need of approval, security, and acceptance, but he is least likely to feel these unless they are forthcoming through insightful planning on the part of some special community agencies including the schools. WHO AND WHAT IS A DELINQUENT? Different persons in the community look at the delinquent through different windows. What each sees through his own window may vary considerably from what is seen by others. The policeman, viewing the young offender largely in terms of the legal aspects of misbehavior, is concerned mainly with what he did and the evidence to substantiate it. The social worker is not concerned so much with what he did, recognizing behavior to be symptomatic, but rather raises the question of the meaning of the malbehavior or the why of the behavioral mechanism. At the other extreme, the complainant or the offended party may view the behavior only in terms of the harm and hurt that he has suffered. His point of view may be charged with revenge or retaliation, and he may see the delinquent as a junior criminal who must be punished or put away. Much misunderstanding can and does arise from these varying viewpoints within a community. Teachers need to recheck their own attitudes and note if they fall on the side of the complainant, the policeman, or the social worker. The Legal Look Legally a youngster under a certain age, which varies from state to state (18 in most states), is a delinquent only when a juvenile court adjudicates to this effect. This means that he has committed a specific act or acts in violation of some law of the state or an ordinance or regulation of a subdivision of the state. The term delinquent may also include those children who are wayward or habitually disobedient, the habitually truant from home or school, and the children who habitually behave so as to impair or endanger the morals or health of self or others. There are many children who engage in delinquent-like behavior but who never arrive at official status since they are not brought to the court's attention. Studies of "hidden delinquency" indicate that less than 2 percent of the youngsters, who commit offenses for which they could be charged officially as delinquent, actually show up in official statistics. These same studies also suggest that many nondelinquents have been as delinquent, if not more so, than their officially dubbed counterparts, judging from the number and types of offenses reported by the nondelinquents themselves. Several implications are evident: (a) Many children work out their behavior problems without the help of a vast network of social and clinical agencies. (b) The general prevalence of delinquent behavior among children and youth suggests a strong cultural determinant. (c) There is an unknown number of factors operating to screen and "protect" some youngsters from court treatment. (d) Studies based upon court cases, a hardy breed of delinquents, may be somewhat misleading if they are treated like a true or unselected sample of the universe of delinquent-like behavioral deviates. One of the difficult problems to be faced by all community workers centers on the question: Shall we take this malbehaving child to the court agency? Following the lead of the research findings that relate to the number of offenses committed by delinquents prior to their first court referral, the implication is that this is done only as a last resort and only for certain carefully selected cases. School personnel and other referring agents make the serious error of delaying or postponing their use of courts. To some extent this reluctance to refer malbehaving juveniles to the proper legal resources stems from a combination of a misunderstanding of the nature, purpose, functioning, and climate of the juvenile court and from a false sentimentality involving "protection from the stigma of the court." Some of this hesitancy stems from the hard fact that many juvenile courts are juvenile courts in name only. When an apparent delinquent act occurs and when school personnel are in doubt as to the best disposition of the case, it is good policy and practice to confer with the local police, preferably a member of the juvenile aid division, or with the local pro |