Study dispels myths about street children

SEJUP (Servico Brasileiro de Justica e Paz), News from Brazil, No. 291, 24 October 1997

A recent study carried out by the School of Public Health of the State University of Sao Paulo (USP) and financed by the Ministry of Justice dispelled a number of myths about street children and their families in Sao Paulo. The survey shows that contrary to what had been thought, the families of street children are structured and their members are not unemployed, vagabonds or 'good-for-nothings' commented sociologist Rubens Adorno who teaches in the USP School of Public Health and who was responsible for the coordination of the survey.

The survey interviewed 390 family members of youth held in young offenders prisons (FEBEM) between March and June of this year and the results caused a number of surprises:

• 77.7% of the families from which the street children originated live in places which have a complete infra-structure including light, water, sewerage connection, rubbish collection and paved streets. 15.4% of such families live in shanty towns (favelas).
• 66.8% of the parents of street children own their own houses.
• 74% of the street children lived with their legitimate parents.
• At the time when they were admitted to FEBEM, 68.5% of the children lived with their families and 19.2% had left their families to live on the streets.
• Generally such young offenders do not live in over-crowded houses. 78% lived in houses with up to 3 people per room.
• The majority do not come from large families. 62% are from families with up to two children.
• Poverty and not misery would be the economic characteristic of the families from which these children originate. 56.8% of their parents earn between US $100 and US $500 per month.
• A large majority of their parents had once earned regular salaries but because of lay-offs this number had stood at 35.5% at the time of the survey. Unemployed families of such youth had increased from 2.3% to 17.3%.
• The majority of the parents (56.6%) of these children were born in the State of Sao Paulo.
• Religious participation is the principal community activity of the parents of the children. 44% participate in evangelical churches and 24% in the Catholic Church.
  The results show that it is not the family structure which generates street children but the lack of public leisure areas, culture and education which such occupy the free time of these youth commented the survey coordinator, Rubens Adorno.

  The president of FEBEM, Eduardo Roberto Domingues da Silva, commented that at least 20% of the 3094 youth offenders in the institution should not be there but should be released conditionally. 46.12% of the offenders are from the city of Sao Paulo; 56.5% are in the 17 to 18 age bracket.

• Half of the children who are not in school live in northeast Brazil.

According to a report in the 'Folha de Sao Paulo' on October 16, half of the children between 7 and 14 years who are not in school live in the north-east. Ministry of Education statistics show that 1.8 million children in this age group do not attend school. 22% are concentrated in the south-east; 14% in the north; 10% in the south and 4% in the center-west.

In absolute numbers Bahia is the state with the largest number of children in the 7 to 14 year age group who do not attend school - 216.9 thousand. On the other hand, Alagoas is the state which has the largest proportion not attending school - 17.7%.