Trends Affecting School-Age Children in Poverty

A complicated system of programs presently addresses the needs of children living in poverty in America. In Mott Haven, these include health care, primarily Medicaid, although recent changes in the welfare laws have made this much more difficult for many poor children to obtain easily. Mott Haven is a district at the southernmost end of the Bronx, one of New York City's five boroughs, located north of Manhattan. Of the city's 59 districts, Mott Haven is one of the three highest at-risk communities, considered on the basis of economic condi

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sectarian welfare agencies, but these [organizations] were grievously insufficient to deal with the serious economic and social problems of immigrants, factory workers, displaced Native Americans and Spanish-speaking persons, and urban residents (p. 2). These institutions were usually organized at the local level, in an attempt to deal with local problems. The Great Depression of the 1930s finally convinced Americans to begin to address social concerns seriously at a national level. The concerns of children, especially children living in poverty, were poorly addressed within these more general organizational efforts. Culturally, the concept of childhood is a relatively recent idea. As late as the early 20th century, many children worked adult hours in industrial settings (though they were not paid an adult wage), and Sigmund Freud was one of the first scholarly thinkers to propose the then-radical notion that children were, by their nature, different from adults and in need of special considerations in order to develop properly. The federal government took more than eight years to finally enact the national Children's Bureau; however, its powers were limited and its initial budget was less than 2 percent of the money given t
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Approximate Word count = 2086
Approximate Pages = 8 (250 words per page)

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