Bullying in Cyberspace

Is technology hurting our youth?

Stopping or curbing physical and/or emotional bullying in schools is no easy task, but add to it the newest form of bullying to emerge in this technological age and it is near impossible to keep kids from being impacted by bullying both in and outside the school. According to a study done in 2010 by the Cyberbullying Research Center, one in five middle school students in the United States have been affected by cyber bullying (defined as “willful and repeated harm inflicted through phones and computers.”)

A recent New York Times Article brings this issue to the forefront. Read our synopsis of it here.

Surveys

In working effectively with contemporary youth there is great value in understanding what motivates and/or influences their thoughts and actions. With this in mind the Center for Youth Studies has created three surveys; one on happiness, one on concerns, and the other on influences. These surveys were designed to give youth themselves an opportunity to creatively reflect on their own motivations and influences as well as to give others a greater understanding of overall trends in motivations and drives among the youth in our culture. It is our hope that these results and the continued studies of youth and youth culture will better equip both youth themselves and those who work with them to effect change in the cultures and localities in which they live and work. 

Concerns Survey

Happiness Survey

Influences Survey

We invite you to take these back to your youth, either in electronic or print format (to print blank surveys, simply print directly from your internet browser). We predict that if done in a mindful way, they will take from 5 to 10 minutes to complete.

This might also be a good opportunity to talk to your youth about their values.

We've also developed a short survey for youth workers. This is designed to promote thought and discussion about the issues youth workers face on a daily basis.

Urban Youth Violence

Urban youth violence has become important and threatening enough to be declared a public health issue: a threat to the physical safety of urban dwellers (especially youth). 

The recent epidemic of youth violence began during the 1980s, a period of economic prosperity.  Since then, homicide rates—the most obvious indicator of youth violence—have declined significantly since their peak in 1993. But other indicators (such as aggravated assault rates as well as youths' confidential self-reporting of violent crimes) are still much higher than pre-epidemic levels.  Youth are still engaged in consistently violent behavior, indicating that there is still a strong possibility violence could again spiral out of control. 


View our recent review of the 2001 Surgeon General's Report on Youth Violence, as well as an extensive resource page, including links to national youth violence statistics from the FBI, youth violence intervention programs, as well as recent studies of youth violence in Boston, Massachusetts. 

New CYS Website is Up!

The new and improved CYS website is now up!
We are excited to announce that our new site is now live. There are still a few glitches that need to be worked out, so we ask your patience as we work diligently to improve this resource over the coming days and weeks. As always your input is greatly appreciated.

More updates to come soon....

Updated Troubled Youth Resources Page

About 10 percent of most of our communities are teenagers. Our experience leads us to assume that 20 percent of these teenagers are unusually mature and well adjusted...perhaps leaders among their peers and in the community. About 60 percent of these young people may be considered average young people experiencing the ups and downs of teenager life; they live threatened by what we might consider a normal amount of risk factors. But around 20 percent are experiencing problems with which they need help. Of these, some 5 percent of all young people are in danger of doing serious damage to themselves or others if there is no special intervention. 


To look for ways to help, view our newly updated Troubled Youth Resources Page with resources for parents, educators, and anyone working with youth. 

Latest Encyclopedia Updates

As mentioned in the previous post, all Center for Youth Studies updates will be posted here. Normally, new encyclopedia articles will be posted here as they are posted. However since Facebook has not been updated in a while, we wanted to let you know of some recent additions over the last month or so:

Bullying
What is bullying and how can we respond to it?

Why must bullying be stopped?


Crime/Criminal Justice Programs
Does the DYS work?


Emotional Intelligence
What is Emotional Intelligence?


Family
Multigenerational households: How big is too big?


Nigerian Youth
What causes violence?


Subcultures
How far will youth go to express themselves?

We Need Your Help!

THE CENTER FOR YOUTH STUDIES HAS A NEW BLOG!!

From now on, updates, news, announcements about new articles, etc. will be posted here, and will appear automatically on both FaceBook and Twitter. 

Over the past few months, The Center for Youth Studies has been working on a a new "facelift," both of our website and of the tools and services we provide. We are excited to announce that over the next few weeks, we will be rolling out a new and improved website which will include new media tools and many updates and/or improvements to some of our old resources. These will include, but are by no means limited to:
- More audio and video content
- Changes to our Resource Centers
- A "how to" tutorial on how to best utilize the Encyclopedia

As we move forward, we've created a "test" site with some sample content to give others a chance to view and comment on these changes before they are official. This new site can be found by clicking here. Please note that this site is only temporary.

We appreciate your feedback as we implement these changes. We are also viewing this is an opportune time to review the content of our current website  with a critical eye and make changes that would be most beneficial to those working with youth. If you have any comments or suggestions on either the new website or the content of the old website, we would appreciate your comments on this post. Please note that all comments posted will be reviewed before they will appear on the site.

We appreciate your help.

Stay tuned for further updates on the latest exciting updates to the Encyclopedia.