Teenage Pregnancy And Social Exclusion Social Work Essay

Teenage Pregnancy And Social Exclusion Social Work Essay The aim of this study or discussion is to analyse and discuss the impact of the labour government policy on teenage pregnancy and social exclusion in the United Kingdom, to what extent has the policy achieved its aims and objectives and if the objectives have not been met, why and how it may be improved, what are its shortcomings and constraints in the implementation process or if the policy itself was not well put together. Barry (2002) argues that social exclusion occurs when individuals or groups are not given the opportunity to participate in society, whether or not they desire to participate. The British Government in 2001 defined social exclusion as a shorthand term for what can happen when people or areas suffer from a combination of linked problems such as unemployment, poor skills, low incomes, poor housing, high crime, bad health and family breakdown.(Cabinet Office, 2001) Burchardt, Le Grand and Piachaud, (2002) identify consumption (the capacity to purchase goods and services, including health services), production (taking part in economically or socially valuable activities including voluntary work), political interaction or participation (involvement in local or national decision-making) and social interactions (integration with family, friends and the wider community) as the four key elements of social participation. These elements individually can represent an outcome measure for social exclusion or inclusion. Teenage pregnancy is a risk factor for social exclusion. Social disadvantage refers to a range of social and economic difficulties an individual can face such as unemployment, poverty, and discrimination and is distributed unequally on the basis of socio-demographic characteristics such as ethnicity, socioeconomic position, educational level, and place of residence (Wellings and Kane, 1999). Social exclusion can happen to anybody but is more prevalent among young people in care, young people not in school and among teenagers growing up in low income households , or those growing up with family conflicts and people from some minority ethnic communities are disproportionately at risk of social exclusion. people are also most vulnerable at periods such as leaving home, care or education. Teenage birth rates in the UK are the highest in Western Europe and pregnancy among girls under sixteen years of age in England and Wales have increased since 2006, more than four in ten girls still get pregnant before the age of twenty. Two-thirds of all students have sex before graduating from school and are exposed to pregnancy and sexually transmitted diseases. (ONS, 2009). Social exclusion Unit (2001) in their report to cabinet said that In England, there are nearly 90,000 conceptions a year to teenagers; around 7,700 to girls under 16 and 2,200 to girls aged 14 or under. Roughly three-fifths of conceptions 56,000 result in live births. Although more than two-thirds of under 16s do not have sex and most teenage girls reach their twenties without getting pregnant, the UK has teenage birth rates which are twice as high as in Germany, three times as high as in France and six times as high as in the Netherlands. Teens that get pregnant are less likely to complete their education therefore risks making their future worse. They are more likely to be single parents and are more likely to contract sexually transmitted diseases including HIV. Every year there are new entrants into teenage world. The risk factors that affect early teenage pregnancies are economic disadvantages, peer pressure, emotional distress, sexual beliefs, attitude and skills, family structure, community disadvantages, sexual risk taking and poor contraceptive use. (Kirby, 2007). The main policy initiatives (750) New Labour (1997) introduced policies that aim to reduce young peoples risks of low educational attainment, poor or no job prospects, criminality and offending, teenage pregnancy and sexually transmitted infections (STIs). Tony Blair (PM, 2001) in a foreword to the Report by the Social Exclusion Unit on Preventing Social exclusion said Preventing exclusion where we can, reintegrating those who have become excluded, and investing in basic minimum standards for all and we have worked in a new way developing partnerships around common goals with the public services, communities and charities, businesses and church organisations that have been struggling with the causes and symptoms of poverty for so long. The policy used risk management approaches as a way of reducing risks of teenage pregnancy and sexually transmitted diseases amongst young people by using strategies that gives the individual choices , responsibilities and make them part of the solution. New Labours policies on teenage pregnancy centres around teenage pregnancy and sexuality using Knowledge Acquisition, Shifting Blame and Constituting Knowing Active Welfare Citizens as strategic Risk Management options. The New Labour government set up a Teenage Pregnancy Strategy overseen by the Teenage Pregnancy Unit and the strategy centres on reducing the rate of teenage conceptions, with the specific aim of halving the rate of conceptions among under 18s by 2010. Getting more teenage parents into education, training or employment, to reduce their risk of long term social exclusion. The Social Exclusion Unit was setup by the New Labour government to co-ordinate policy-making issues like school exclusion and truancy, rough sleeping, teenage pregnancy, youth at risk and deprived neighbourhoods through, preventing social exclusion happening in the first place by reducing the numbers who go through experiences that put them at risk or targeting action to compensate for the impact of these experiences , reintegrating those who become excluded back into society, by providing clear ways back for those who have lost their job or their housing, and missed out on learning and getting the basics right by delivering basic minimum standards to everyone in health, education, in-work income, employment and tackling crime. Critically analyse policies-SID,RED,MUD Critical analysis of the Policy, (2000) Action to prevent social exclusion is delivering results: the proportion of children in homes where no-one is in work has fallen from 17.9 per cent in 1997 to 15.1 per cent in 2001; over 100,000 children are benefiting from the Sure Start programme to ensure they are ready to learn by the time they reach primary school; school exclusions have fallen by 18 per cent between 1997 and 1999; under-18 conception rates have fallen in four out of the last five quarters; more 16-18 year olds are staying on in education; the Care Leavers strategy has been introduced; the Rough Sleepers Unit is piloting new approaches to end the fast track to homelessness from prison and the Armed Forces; Summary Stakeholder Pensions will help moderate earners build up better pension entitlements from this April. Some 18 million people stand to gain from the State Second Pension, providing more support than under the State Earnings Related Pension Scheme (SERPS) for modest and low paid workers, and for carers and the disabled; and the personal tax and benefit measures introduced over this Parliament mean that by October 2001, a single-earner family on half average earnings and with two young children will be  £3,000 a year better off in real terms compared with 1997. Families with someone in full-time work will have a guaranteed minimum income of at least  £225 a week,  £11,700 a year. And families with children in the poorest fifth of the population will on average be  £1,700 a year or around 15 per cent better off. And programmes to reintegrate people who have become excluded are recording successes: since 1997 more than 270,000 young unemployed people have moved into work through the New Deal for Young People; over 6,000 people have found work through the New Deal for Disabled People and over 75,000 people had found work between October 1998 and December 2000 through the New Deal for Lone Parents; all Local Education Authorities (LEAs) have increased provision for excluded pupils, a third already do so, and two-thirds plan to offer them full-time education in 2001; between June 1998 and June 2000, the number of rough sleepers fell by 36 per cent; and the proportion of teenage parents in education, employment or training has increased from 16 to 31 per cent between 1997 and 2000. And changes in basic public and private services are focusing improvements on the poorest: higher standards than ever before in Key Stage 2 English and maths with a ten and 13 percentage point improvement in each subject respectively between 1998 and 2000; 44 Local Education Authorities (LEAs) in the 88 most deprived areas2 improved their Key Stage 2 maths results by 14 per cent or more between 1998 and 2000. The most improved area was Tower Hamlets, with an increase of 23 per cent; 24 LEAs in deprived areas improved their Key Stage 2 English results by 11 per cent or more over the same period; between 1998 and 2000 children from most minority ethnic communities saw a rise in achievement of GCSEs. This includes an eight percentage point increase in the number of black pupils achieving five or more GCSE grade A*-C, against an average for all pupils of three percentage points; unemployment has fallen faster than the national average in 19 of the 20 highest unemployment areas; the combined effects of Minimum Income Guarantee (MIG), Winter Fuel Payments and free television licences for those aged 75 and over mean that from April 2001 around two million of the poorest pensioner households will be at least  £800 a year better off compared with 1997 a real terms rise in living standards of 17 per cent. together with tax and benefit reforms, the national minimum wage has helped to make work pay and encourage individuals to move from benefits into work; and by the end of 2000, all the high street banks offered a basic bank account available to all. Preventing social exclusion These improvements are a good start. Trends on literacy, school exclusion, post-16 participation and rough sleeping are on track. Incomes for the poorest pensioners and families, and for low-paid workers, have risen substantially. Where programmes have been slow to deliver results, for example on truancy, the Government is intensifying action. But many of the programmes in this document are only in their infancy, and are on course to deliver more substantial results over time. At the same time, policy innovation has been accompanied by new structures and new ways of working within Government. These have created clearer accountability for cross-cutting subjects such as rough sleeping, neighbourhood renewal and youth policy; set the basis for a new relationship of Partnership with groups outside Government; organised services around the needs of the client; and helped people to help themselves Policy can exacerbate and not alleviate Conclusion (500) The 1999 UK governments report on teenage pregnancy concluded that the following were risk factors for pregnancies among teenage girls: socioeconomic disadvantage, having been oneself the child of a teenage parent, poor communication with parents, not being in education, training or work after age 16 years, peer pressure to have sex early, educational problems such as low achievement and truancy, alcohol use, low knowledge about sexual health, and learning about sex from sources other than school However, these conclusions were based on evidence that was rather old or from cross-sectional studies, which are not the best guide to current trends

Death benefits Essay

Scholars such as Gnckenzie (2007) advised people to take action before the 1st of July in order to ensure that they stand an opportunity to benefit under the new super rules. Among the things people were advised to do were to make a clear review on their nominations of death benefits, to make sure that they were still appropriate and in the current manner. Doing a review on insurance cover was also necessary to consider whether the amount in the account should be increased or not. Another strategy was to do a combination of all or part of the money for those who started their funds before 1983, the 1st of July. The set one million as a limit was also supposed to be utilized by people if they were to get advantage in the new changes. According to Betamann (2006) a person was supposed to make sure that they had effectively quoted the number on the tax file (TFN) to make good use of the new rules on their superannuation funds. Co-contributions were to be appropriately made to the government for the people whose contributions on the super is non-concessional, all these were recommended to be done before 1st July 2007. People were also advised to review their arrangements on salary contributions and confirm that the contributions they made did not go above the set limits. The set one million as a limit should be utilized by people if they are to get advantage in the new changes. A recommendation was also made that one should make sure that they have effectively quoted the TFN to make good use of the new rules on their superannuation funds. Co-contributions should be appropriately made to the government for the people whose contributions on the super is non-concessional. Annette (2006) advised people to make a review on minimum payments allocated on pension and be careful about the amount of money they withdraw, because if one withdraws a lot of money, then it means their accounts would soon run out. There was an advice to people to make applications for the health card of the seniors if they were legible for that. Checking whether one would suitably fit in the non-commutable to be able to enjoy the benefit of exception on the asset test which is on a 50% limit. Conclusion By and large the, the changes made on the 2007 simplified superannuation Act as Gnckenzie (2007) stated, have had a great improvement on the lives of the employees who were approaching retirement period. The exemption of tax, tax deduction, reduction of tax on death penalties and tax free death benefits upon the immediate dependents are among the benefits the seniors have enjoyed. However, the limitations introduced in the Act may have negative effects on the retirees who may not be able to comply. If a retiree takes action on the advice offered by the scholars, then they stand a great chance to take advantage of the 1st of July simplified superannuation Act. References Annette, N. (2006).Choices of Individual Investment and Retirement Enhancement: The Subcommittee Hearing. New York: McGraw Publishers. Batemann, H. (2006). Retirement Provision in Scary Markets (3rd ed. ). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Clare, S. (2005). Retirement in Australia and Superannuation: The Government Fund. Cambridge: Anderson Publishers. Cohen, P. (1998). Superannuation and Retirement (2nd ed. ). Chicago: Moody Press Gnckenzie, R. (2007). The Book That talks On Money: How to Manage Your Money Well. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Different forms of communication Essay

Nonverbal communication is a way in with we communicate without speaking, this can be using many different methods. Sign langue this is way in which we can communicate with a people who have hearing impairments. With children and young people you can use makaton witch is a basic from of sing langue. For adults you can use B.S.L which is short for British Sign Language. â€Å"The British Deaf Association states that BSL is a first or preferred language for nearly 7, 00000 people in the UK.†(Nolan, Moonie, and Lavers 20005 health and social care page 13). Learning just a few simple sings and phrases will help with how you are able to relate to death people and how they respond to you. Pictures and symbols: they are more common than you may think. For example road symbols, a zebra crossing has flashing belisha beacons these tell you where is safe to cross, also there are zebra crossing with traffic lights a red man flashes up when it is not safe to cross, when it is safe it flashes a green man. They also have a loud beeping sound. Most places use symbols to inform us and the workers about health and safety for example in a kitchen if the floor has just been cleaned, health and safety states that you must put up a bollard or board displaying caution Wet Floor! Body language, the way we stand or sit can show a lot for example if you stand with your arms folded it could mean a few things but most people often portray this as being protective. If you were to have your arms in your lap you would be seen as more open, friendlily and relaxed. We can tell a lot from facial expressions we make assumptions of what we think people are feeling. For example it is quite easy to see if someone is smiling or frowning. Touch or contact this can be shown in many different ways for example a friendly gesture could be a simple hand shake or offering a person your arm to help them cross a road, another form of friendliness is to rest you hand or some ones shoulder as reassurance or as encouragement. A negative from of touch or contact can be an inappropriate sexual gesture for example slapping or pinching some ones bottom. Verbal communication is a way of using your words and phrases carefully and accurately good verbal communication is essential. There are many types of this. One to one this is when one person communicates with another in a private conversation without other people joining in. this is mostly an intense conversation between two people exchanging information, which should be maintained a remembered and not subject to any other person. An advantage of this could be than an individual receives specialist assistance, help or support. A disadvantage of this could be that the information could be biased. Group discussion this a little harder as it is only effective and works properly if everybody gets involved and has a chance to share their thoughts and opinions. In most groups there are some people who talk a lot and some that say very little or nothing at tall. The people that talk a lot may over power the discussion and people may get left out. This can create an unfair discussion. Away around this could be to pass an object around and the person who hold it is the only that can speak; you could also set a time limit of about 1minute. Written communication is a crucial part of working with in the caring services as it vital to keep records and reports. They must be hand written it is unacceptable to abbreviate words or use informal language. There are many other forms of written communication like letters, voicemail, newspaper and magazine articles. Written communication is very significant to within the business world, one of the main reasons is conformation of sails emails are ok but can be tampered with. Another reason that written communication is key to business is contracts with other business. The Advantages of written communication are: It is strate to the point and the information is precisely and accurate. Another advantage is that Legal defences trusts written information as thy uses on a regular basis the written information as it pervades valid and trustworthy records. The disadvantages of written communication are: if you were to send a letter to somebody far away the responds would not be instant and may tack a few weeks to be delved. A big disadvantage of written communication is than not every may be able to understand you hand writing. Informal communication is for people who know each other well and maybe be used between those who work closely together on a day to day basis. This form of communication is used with personal conversations. Informal communication can help build better relationships with the staff you work with. An advantage of Informal communication allows you a variety of words according to the area you live in. For example a few of them things are phrases like hay up duck or you all right love. A disadvantage is you may say a word or sentence mean one thing, but some else might interpreted a have a whole different meaning. Formal communication is most likely to start with phrases and greetings like â€Å"Good Morning, â€Å"Good Afternoon† or â€Å"how are you today†? It mostly used when communicating with professional people such as lawyers, other examples of this is a nurse talking to patient. Advantages of this form of communication are: that is straight forward and to the point it has no slang or abbreviations. A disadvantage is that people don’t always use plain English so the information could be misinterpreted. Technological communication aids we have may electronically devices to help use communicate with people, most of these devices have change the manner in which we communicate with people, because of some devices we don’t talk with our friends or family as much as we used to we just send an electronically message this could be a text or picture message or email. Telephone amplifier this is device than can be attached to you telephone which can make the incoming calls louder and clearer to hear. These devices can be attached to either the ear piece of the handset or between the phone and handset only if you handset is detachable. An advantage of this is than is clear and easy to hear what a person is saying to you, a dis advantage is that simple plug in telephones are become less used instead they are being re place with cordless telephones. Mobile phones now days nearly everyone owns a mobile phone. Either a plain and simple phone than just has texts and calls. Or a more advanced phone with lots of feathers like radio, keypad, mp3, touchscreen and apps (applications). This device has helped change the way we communicate with our friends and family. There are many advantages to owning a mobile phone: you are contactable no matter where you are. Also if you had an accident or saw an accident you would be able to get help. There are a lot of disadvantages for having a phone. Is that they could become a detraction at work. The most common one is than people use them when driving this highly dangerous and Couse a lot of accidents another disadvantage is that the older generation of people struggle to lean and understand how to use them effective and just think they are pointless or a nuisance. Also a bad thing about mobiles is they are always being improved. One other disadvantage is theft. Social networking sites have changed the way we interact with people. There are many different social networking sites, flicker, hi 5, msn; facebook and twitter the last two are the most commonly known and used. We can talk to friends and their friends but the scary thing is we don’t even know if our friends are how the say they are, so we must be very careful how we talk to people, we must also be careful what we say or write about on social network sites, as what you have said can never be totally removed from the computer hard drive. The advantages of this form of communication are that you can upload photos and videos. Emails are like electronic letters, they give us a lot of important information. Advantages of emails are they are instant they are cheaper than letters as no postage for the stamp is required, also they are extremely fast compared to traditional letters. Most companies now use emails as it an instant way of advertising as they can email hundreds of people at once. Disadvantages are that you receive scam emails which can place versus onto your computer. Another disadvantage is that some emails clam to be legitimate but scam the user into proving personal information like bank details, and address on a fake website the information is then used for indemnity theft.

Women s Literature Oppression And The Role Of A Woman

Evan Rhodes Survey of World Literature December 1, 2014 Hartmann Women in Literature: Oppression and the Role of a Woman In early literature, men dominated the writers’ circuit. As literature began, it was used as an easily digestible way to promote social norms and moral code. In these texts, the role of women changes vastly depending on the culture, although there is a common theme: women exist to belong to a man. Women were not only oppressed in life, but their struggle is weaved into all of these texts, where in hindsight we can read them and see how belittled women were. These stories, written by men, all seem to have the same theme that a woman’s only value lays in her loyalty to her husband. Women in these times did not have a chance to speak out or think for themselves because they were not allowed. I looked specifically at three women from three stories, across culturally different times and societies. 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