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Provide
supervision.
Family, school and friends are important, especially when children are
young. Guided supervision, however, is necessary to create structured
study habits and play time. Kids have long lists of activities these days.
While those can make them competitive and self-sufficient, they can also
make them self-centered and self-indulgent unless they are guided and
supervised.
Encourage
them to reflect. Time for reflection -- discussion, prayer,
whatever you want to call it -- with others is important. Kids need to
spend time thinking about values. They need time to look internally to
see how they're doing as they experience personal growth. Families, friends
and schools can help with those values.
Promote discussion.
The kids I work with have a hard time seeing anything as a moral issue.
They have never seen the value in life. Life is so dispensable; it's just
another thing that comes and goes. In a group, we can share our insecurities,
our strengths, our weaknesses, our doubts, what we believe in. There's
value in that.
Remember
that kids can turn around. It's very rewarding when they do.
If you just save a couple, that's a lot because they have impact on other
kids. For example, I had a 14-year-old sentenced for murder, who had demonstrated
model behavior in the juvenile facility. When he turned 17, I got him
transferred to a rehabilitation center instead of the adult facility.
There he attended high school, became one of the stars of their basketball
team and graduated last summer. Now he's going to college in Florida and
spending breaks talking to kids in a detention center.
Be realistic.
Of course, there are no guarantees. I've known families who gave their
kids all the right things, and the kids still took the wrong path. We
don't know what happens. We just don't know the inner mystery of one's
personhood. It's "there, but for the grace of God, go I." There
are no simple answers.
An assistant public defender in Chicago's Cook
County Juvenile Court, Russley strives to get repeat offenders into rehabilitation.
For 14 years, she has declined opportunities to move elsewhere because
she feels her longitude offers children continuity. ("I try to keep
up with them, in placement or incarceration, and write to at least one
every day.") She previously taught at UC and the Dominican University,
where she earned an MBA, followed by a JD from Loyola.
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