A November 2010 report issued by Volunteers of America that mothers are the fastest growing segment of the U.S. prison population.
Childhood Disrupted: Understanding the effects of Maternal Incarceration examines the plight of mothers from 1991 to 2007, the latest available date for data.
Volunteers of America foundedLook Up and Hope, one of five programs in the entire U.S. that deals specifically with issues faced by incarcerated mothers and their families. The need for such programs is evident in statistics provided by VOA which declared that in Illinois alone the number of incarcerated mothers skyrocketed over fifty percent with rates rising from 29,500 in 1991 to 65,600 in 2007.
Childhood Disrupted also discovered:
Two-thirds of females incarcerated in the U.S. are mothers.
Over 150,000 children in the U.S. have a mother who is incarcerated
in a state or federal prison.
Forty percent of caregivers for children of incarcerated mothers claim
they do not have sufficient funds to properly care for the child(ren).
Transportation was a problem for forty percent of the caregivers.
Eighty percent of children in the study had positive feelings concerning the impending release of their mother.
To view the full report Click here to go to website
Source: Chicago Sun-Times
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