Child Poverty in Rural Areas

Evidence from around the world suggests that children experience poverty as a condition that is damaging to their mental, physical, emotional, and spiritual development. This chapter sheds light on the ways in which poverty impacts rural children and what poverty reduction means in the lives of African children. While children suffer the worst outcomes overall, children in rural areas are significantly more deprived than urban children. The three deprivations which overlap to impact rural children under two years old the most are water, protection (i.e., security), and housing. For these reasons, there are compelling economic, social, and moral grounds that compel us to evaluate child poverty in rural areas in order to understand its severity and urgently find relevant policy solutions.

General Synod of the Scottish Episcopal Church

The General Synod of the Scottish Episcopal Church (SEC) met in virtual form on 10 and 11 June 2021. In his charge to Synod, the Most Rev'd Dr Mark Strange, Primus, encouraged Synod members not to place their light under a bushel. The COVID-19 pandemic had denied people opportunities normally available to them to make their light shine and, at times, the bushel had felt very close. He reminded Synod members that in the valley of the shadow of death one need fear no evil. The evils of child poverty, the plight of refugees and unwarranted attacks on individuals in the public eye were all current evils to be confronted. Despite everything, the place of quiet waters and the comfort of the Shepherd's rod and staff still brought hope and joy, even in a pandemic.

Social and Economic Costs of Inequality in the State of Virginia

This study examined selected social and economic costs of inequality in the state of Virginia. We explored the extent of inequality of place across the state, finding significant inequalities between counties on measures such as household income, poverty, college completion, single parenthood, and racial segregation. These inequalities of place were strongly associated with inequalities in the adult outcomes of children raised in different areas of the state, including unequal household income and unequal rates of upward mobility, college completion, incarceration, and marriage in adulthood. When examining the association between homicides and concentrated disadvantage in the capital city of Richmond, our mapping techniques demonstrated a strong association. Finally, we estimated that child poverty results in billions of dollars of economic costs to the state each year.

The Diet of Children Attending a Holiday Programme in the UK: Adherence to UK Food-Based Dietary Guidelines and School Food Standards

Child poverty rates are rising, particularly in London, putting more children at risk of experiencing food insecurity. Holiday programmes in the UK provide children who receive free schools meals during term time with access to free/low-cost holiday clubs offering nutritious food and enriching activities during the school holidays. This study aimed to investigate whether children’s dietary intake was more adherent to the UK Eatwell Guide throughout the day and meets School Food Standards (SFS) for the lunchtime meal on a club attendance versus a non-attendance day. A repeated measures design was used to assess data on the food and drink intake of children (n = 57) aged 7–16 years old using a 24 h recall method on two separate occasions: once based on an attending club day and once based on a non-attending club day. The results showed children’s diet quality improved (p = 0.007) on an attending club day (mean: 58.0 ± SD 12.6) versus a non-attending club day (51.8 ± 15.0). Children also more closely adhered to the SFS (p = 0.001) on an attending club day (median = 9, interquartile range = 8–9) versus a non-attending club day (median = 7, interquartile range = 6–8). This suggests that holiday programmes targeting children who receive free school meals during term time have the potential to improve children’s dietary behaviours during the school holidays, underlining the importance of holiday programmes to support food security.

The (in)credible fiscal prize: A critical examination of the discourse of evidence in early childhood intervention

In playing with the concept of ‘credibility’, this article presents a critical examination of the discourse of evidence and the programming of upbringing in early intervention policy and practice. The truth claims of the evidence discourse in policy are explored through a single complex case study of an early intervention city in Northern Ireland. The framework for the study discussed uses Bourdieu's thinking tools of habitus, capital and field alongside Foucauldian discourse analysis to explore the ways in which early intervention policy and practice impact on children, parents and communities. A key question is to consider how evidence is constructed within the discourse and how this can be considered as a Foucauldian regime of truth. Building from the emerging body of critique around scientism and parenting, the study extends this through a sociopolitical lens to the Northern Ireland context. Despite a strong tradition in Northern Ireland of community-based activism and political transition from direct rule to devolution, early intervention policy and programming have tended towards direct read across from Britain and the USA. The study documents that community-based practice struggles within the policy field for recognition, yet ‘home grown’ carries significant social capital within and across communities. The dominant policy discourse of the (in)credible ‘fiscal prize’, transformation through evidence-based interventions contrasts with the backdrop of worsening child poverty in communities. Contrary to the truth claims, this suggests the reproduction rather than transformation of social disadvantage.

Social Work and Facing Child Poverty in Iraq: A Comparative Study between Governmental Social Work Institutions and Non-Governmental Institutions

Social work is a profession to help individuals, families, and communities to promote the well-being of the human and society, and this goal is achieved through social and economic justice while enhancing the quality of life of human and community. The study illustrates the importance of promoting integration with governmental and civil social work institutions to achieve the reduction of multidimensional child poverty. The descriptive and comparative approach as well as the social survey was used in this study. Collected data from 50 governmental and non-governmental institutions, where the study reached several conclusions, the most important of which is that social work institutions have an important and effective role in confronting the poverty of children in Iraq despite the existence of economic and social obstacles to their work. It also showed the contribution of non-governmental institutions to alleviating the burden on the government by providing assistance that enables poor families to cope with the poor standard of living and to enable them to get out of poverty.

Work Hours Instability and Child Poverty: Response of the Safety-Net Programs

This paper uses data from the Survey of Income and Program Participation to investigate how intra-year caregiver work-hours volatility is related to child poverty, measured through both the official poverty measure (OPM) and the supplemental poverty measure (SPM). I further assess varying degrees of buffering effects of cash benefits, in-kind benefits, and tax transfers on income in the context of work-hours volatility. Results indicate that Black and Hispanic children, as well as those living with unpartnered single mothers, faced substantially higher variability in household market hours worked. Hispanic children experienced not only greater volatility in their caregivers’ work hours, but also higher poverty levels, even after taking government programs into account. I find that a 10 percent increase in intra-year hours volatility is linked to roughly a 2 percent and 1.6 percent increase in OPM and SPM child poverty, respectively. In-kind benefits are more effective in buffering household income declines resulting from unstable caregiver work hours, followed by tax transfers and cash benefits, which each offer somewhat less of a buffering effect. The effectiveness of near-cash benefits is particularly salient among Black children and children of unpartnered single mothers. Hispanic children also benefited from these transfers’ compensating effects, but to a lesser degree. These results provide new evidence to inform public policy discussions surrounding the best ways to help socioeconomically disadvantaged families to retain benefits and smooth their income in the face of frequent variation in work hours and, thus, earnings.