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26 SEPTEMBER 2008
NO 1352
Orphanages
"Our movement is quiet," said orphanage advocate Richard McKenzie, "but it's unstoppable." McKenzie, an author and economics professor at the University of California at Irvine, grew up in an orphanage.
Far from harboring bitter memories of an Oliver Twist childhood, McKenzie believes that children placed in a residential home can benefit enormously from the structure and stability that are all too often absent from the foster care system.
A child in foster care, McKenzie noted, may be bounced from place to place too often to put down roots. Twenty-three percent of children in foster care live in at least two homes during their time in "the system," while another 20 percent have five placements; an additional 7 percent have seven placements. That's about half being bounced from pillar to post.
"We know from the first large-scale survey of 1,600 alumni from nine orphanages in the South and Midwest that the dismissal of the orphanage as an option was far too quick and related to some ingrained and obsolete Dickensian images of orphanages," McKenzie told a congressional hearing on child care.
According to the study McKenzie cited, an overwhelming majority – 85 percent – of residential home alumni look at their experiences favorably. Their college attendance is 39 percent higher than the general population of their age group.
CHARLOTTE HAYS
Hays, C. (2001) The Orphanage Movement. Appended to Seita, J. (2001) The Road to Home – Is It Time to Bring Back Orphanages? Women's Quarterly, Spring, 2001
http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m0IUK/is_2001_Spring/ai_75453036/pg_1?tag=artBody;col1
