One of the critical concerns concerning adolescents in the past twenty years has been the rapid increase in gang activity and violence in the United States. For a long duration, the relationship between police and the community is from time to time strained. However, in most cases, both need to collaborate to reduce crime. The collaboration will help the law enforcement agencies in identifying the people’s needs. This similarly involves being entangled enough to be aware of adolescents’ way of life, including the family situations, financial position, parental participation, and education eminence. This will inform more accustomed connections and let law enforcement officers provide the individual attention that tackles particular concerns with probable delinquents. By establishing a close relation, the police department may resolve and decrease gang-related activities with the local community.
Initiatives that will assist in rectifying the problems
Research studies indicate that combining prevention and intervention mechanisms is essential to reduce the rising gang membership amongst adolescents (Berson Hernon & Pearsall, 2012). Age-appropriate deterrence approaches ought to be incorporated to give affirmative enforcement to the youths. Various programs that profit children include the D.A.R.E. and the G.R.E.A.T program. The DARE program seeks to educate the kid on the impacts of alcohol and drug abuse. Secondly, the Gang Resistance Education and Training program eliminates youth violence and gang involvement for adolescent indviduals. The course is evidence-based and assessable, including astounding optimistic figures, indicating a 39% decrease in gang membership within a year of concluding the course. Moreover, the course is conducted in a classroom setting and is facilitated by law enforcement agencies. The affirmative effects indicate that education and substantial collaborations amongst police offices and young children is a crucial lever in an attempt to avert gang-related activities.
For local initiatives, the church and the community are actively engaged in achieving a similar objective. For instance, the Youth Violence Reduction Partnership is involved in violence-prone regions. Philadelphia’s Offices of Adult and Juvenile probation, the Philadelphia Police Department, and the Philadelphia Anti-Drug/Anti-Violence Network (PAAN) work collaboratively with adolescents largely expected to murder or be murdered before attaining the age of 25. The critical emphasis is mainly on male adolescences engaged in drug abuse. Individuals enrolled in the program have guaranteed access to job training programs and a safe environment to express themselves through rap and financial planning sessions.
Reducing the Adverse Impacts of Violence on Children
According to American InterContinental University (2017), approximately 60% of American kids are predisposed to violence and abuse in society, households, and learning institutions. The kids are prone to exhibiting violent conduct, for instance, bullying and fighting, and face a significant threat of being involved in criminal activities in the future. To mitigate the impacts, it is crucial to conduct an early identification and intervention. In 2010, United States state attorney Eric Holder initiated the Defending Children Initiative. Split into two phases, the program’s main aim is to allow communities to develop, test, and access procedures to decrease the number of children predisposed to gang-related undertakings. It is also essential for a child to have individuals they can openly talk to concerning an unavoidable occurrence. They may be parents, teachers, or therapists. The kid needs to speak regarding the events and adequately process the events prior to moving on in different paths.
Limitation on the Violent Video Games Children Are Permitted To Play
While numerous games contain educational content, the most widespread games lay great emphasis on encouraging violence. The video games consist of killing people or animals, abuse of drugs and alcohol, car theft, affronting law enforcement officers, prostitution and vehemence towards women, and explicit language (AACAP, 2015). Kids predisposed to violent video games become numb to violence, emulate violent behavior, and exhibit more destructive conduct. Indeed, there should be a restraint on violent video games that kids can engage in. We should aim to develop a society that is extremely sensitive to violent acts. The normalization of violence as a form of entertainment is entirely divergent from those goals. When kids view violence, they ought to see it as a community failure and a challenge that needs to be resolved, not as a case of entertainment or a standard expression of resolving conflicts. Therefore, violence in video games ought to be restricted. It is more of interactions an adolescent has with other persons rather than regarding the kid’s interactions with video games.
Type of Assistance Requested From the Community as a Whole
Creating a healthier connection within the society ought to commence with a dialogue to assess various concerns. Convening for a gathering at the local town hall or community center to recruit volunteers in developing a program that concentrates on policies to diminish criminal activities, gang deterrence, and early interventions. Moreover, various programmes are basically effectual to a degree that they are pertinent to individuals in danger. Textbook versions of academic programs would not feel candid to kids that are in danger. Informed by the societies and individuals that are well acquainted, the programmes may be custom-made for the communities they reside in. Requesting the society to assist in translating the programme and information to suit the society genuinely is a vital phase and enlists the society in the program’s achievements. In this manner, police officers and the community may develop a mutual investment and collaboration in the programmes.
Role of the Department
Engaging the youths and instituting trust may assist in reducing crime, reinstate order, and eliminating fear within the local community. Beginning with learning institutions and being entangled in supplementary programs are objective segments for the officers to emphasize on, as most of the extremely effective plans have confirmed. The police division would take the lead in implementing the program with the society’s assistance in engaging the kids and keeping them occupied. If the adolescences are aware of being held liable and the existence of a commanding, considerate figure regularly keeping an eye on them, the likelihood of tumbling into gang-related activities is reduced. Leaders should likewise recognize vital points of intermediation and the nature of the challenge, generating tools that help synchronize community efforts. The department should again develop a policy set for the plan and execution of the programs.
Measuring the Effectiveness of the Plan
The efficiency of the plan stated above may be assessed by the volume of documented gang activities in the region. Research indicates that by integrating prevention and intervention methods concerning gangs, youth involvement figures had a visible decrease (Howell, 2010). Young kids are mainly attracted to gang way of life when they feel unwelcome in homes or learning institutions, when tormented or mistreated, psychologically or physically. By executing programs to avert and arbitrate in gang participation, we present positive impacts on a kid’s life. The more positives instilled in a society, the lesser gang activity that may be documented.
Conclusion
Even though societies are confronted with the dim realism of criminal violence, it has been established that prevention is a pre-eminent method of reducing the effects of gangs in society and households. Through proactive collaboration with societies, nation-wide programs, and targeted programs to concentrate on the deterrence of gang-related delinquencies, rather than being concerned for casualties or apprehending youths on a retroactive basis, the imminent course for adolescents may be considerably enhanced.
