Incarcerated Parents

Paper Summary:

This paper explains that the increasing number of incarcerated parents is having a severe effect on the lives of the children of these prisoners. It discusses how the welfare system takes on responsibility for these children and that, ultimately, they become the system's problem. The paper concludes that, because it is the country's most basic support for vulnerable children, it is important that the child welfare system begin to address the needs of children with incarcerated parents in a thoughtful, systematic way.

From the Paper:

"In 1998, there was an estimated 200,000 children in the United States that had an imprisoned mother and more than 1.6 million with an imprisoned father (Seymour 1998). However, no one knows for certain how many children in the U.S. have an incarcerated parent (Seymour 1998). The Center for Children of Incarcerated Parents uses a formula for calculating these numbers by multiplying the number of currently incarcerated women by .75, the average number of incarcerated women with children, by 2.4, the average number of children per incarcerated mother; then multiply .56, the average percentage of incarcerated men with children, by 2.0, the average number of children per incarcerated father, and add the two sums together (Seymour 1998). With the incarcerated population in the United States growing by an average of 6.5 percent each year, the number of children with parents in prison will only continue to increase (Seymour 1998)."

More papers on Incarcerated Parents:

• Analytical Essay # 115075 : "Corrections during Incarceration"
• Research Proposal # 29133 : "Maternal Incarceration"
• Research Paper # 93942 : "Incarceration and the Drug Offender"

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