Runaway Children |
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One million children run away each year. The National Center for Health Statistics reports that one youth in ten between the ages of twelve and seventeen had run away from home at some point in their lives. One thing they all have in common is that they’re young and they hurt. Most have had a fight with a parent.
Peak runaway times coincide with the first warm week of spring, just after school has closed for the summer, or when school opens and parents start putting on the pressure to do well. Other times of running away are when report cards are passed out and after the Christmas holidays (when teenagers like adults tall victim to post holiday blues). Runaways today generally stick close to home. Automobile drivers, fear of being robbed makes it harder to thumb rides than it used to be. More kids from working-class and low-income homes are splitting, and they’re less used to long-distance travel.
Most runaways are between fourteen and sixteen, but the age is dropping. A Metropolitan Washington Council on Government study on runaways youths in the Washington area reports that a growing number are in the eleven to thirteen age bracket.
More girls than boys run away. Boys don't show up at runaway shelters as girls are apt to do. Parents don't report boys missing as much as girls. Girls are more likely than boys to run away with friends or to team up with someone they meet on the road. Less use of drugs is found among runaways; most kids no longer consider smoking pot as (drug use.), Most runaways stay away only one to three days. The longer a teenager is on the road, the greater the chances that he won't return home. The more often a youth runs away, the longer he is apt to stay. Sooner or later the chronic runaway remains gone forever.
The name of the game for runaways is survival. They have to eat, have somewhere to sleep, and have connections. They have to depend on the goodwill of friends and strangers whom they can't always trust. Runaways most often turn to friends. They use a friend’s house as shelter. The friend's parents don’t realize that the kid in their son’s bedroom is running away from home, so they don't do anything.
Legally minors lack many of the rights that adults have. They can't work without permits, which parents or guardians must approve. In some school districts they can’t enroll without parental or guardian sponsorship. In some states doctors will not treat a minor without a parent or a guardian present. If runaways are under eighteen they have trouble renting hotel and motel rooms even if they pay in advance; hotels don’t want to be accused of harboring runaways. Most states require parental permission for a teenager to obtain a driver’s license.
For juvenile runaways, the aim is to keep from being picked up by the police. In nine states a runaway child comes within the jurisdiction of the juvenile court as a delinquent child, in fifteen others as a child in need of supervision.
Kids who run away find it harder to survive today than a few years ago. The economic situation makes people less generous, and the fear of crime makes people reluctant to help strangers, even young ones. Panhandling isn’t as easy as it used to be, although girls do much better at it than boys. Free food programs have been dropped even in tolerant cities such as San Francisco. Mission beds have disappeared. Runaways become street-smart fast. They have to.
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