James McCarthy

Carrying and using weapons: A survey of minority junior high school students in New York City

To explore weapon carrying among young, inner-city adolescents, a survey was administered in fall 1993 to 2005 predominately Hispanic students (mean age = 12.8 years) in three New York City junior high schools. The survey revealed that 21% of students reported personally carrying a weapon; guns and knives were the weapons most commonly carried. Most of those who carried guns reported that they bought them. Forty-two percent indicated that they had a family member or close friend who had been shot. Boys and older students were more likely to report carrying weapons. Preventive efforts may need to begin before or on entry into junior high school rather than high school.

Characteristics of users and nonusers of health clinics in inner-city junior high schools.

PURPOSE To compare the demographic, behavioral, psychosocial, and academic characteristics of users versus nonusers of inner-city junior high school-based health clinics. METHODS Students who used (n = 1344) and did not use (n = 2394) the health clinics based in four junior high schools in an economically disadvantaged, medically underserved New York City school district were compared on their responses to a health risk survey administered at the end of the 1991/92 academic year. RESULTS Compared to students who did not use the clinics, students who used the clinics were more likely to have had unprotected sexual intercourse, to have had suicide intentions or attempts, to be suspended from school for fighting, to be exposed to violence and the illicit drug culture, to hold beliefs favoring involvement in sexual intercourse and suicidality, and to have failed subjects in school. CONCLUSIONS Users of these junior high school-based health clinics are engaging in behaviors and hold beliefs that place them at risk for serious adverse health outcomes. School-based clinics have the potential to provide early intervention for these high risk adolescents.

A New School-based Program to Provide Eyeglasses-. ChildSight

OBJECTIVE To address the unmet need for glasses encountered in an urban school setting by developing and implementing a school-based, cost-effective program that provides appropriate spectacle correction to needy children. METHODS A total of 5851 students 9 to 15 years of age in 4 middle schools in northern Manhattan were screened for vision. Those with vision worse than 20/40 were examined, given glasses if appropriate, or referred for additional evaluation. RESULTS Of the 5851 children screened, 1614 (28%) had a failing result, with visual acuity less than 20/40 in the worse eye. Of this group, 1082 were given glasses that were assembled at the school within 1 hour of testing. Ten percent of the group that required glasses already had them, and the remaining were referred for a complete ophthalmic examination that was completed in 58 cases. Only 14 of these had vision loss unrelated to refractive error. CONCLUSIONS The program successfully treated 88.3% of the children within the school who needed glasses. Given that only 10% of children who needed glasses had them, it indicates a huge need to provide glasses to at least a million children in this age group in the United States.

Social Policy and Fertility Change in Ireland The Push to Legislate in Favour of Women's Agency

This article explores the background to the conclusive drop in Irish fertility rates over the last two decades, from a total fertility rate of 3.55 in 1975 to 1.87 in 1995. This steep decline marks the end of Irelands position as demographic outlier in Europe, which has proved a compelling topic of investigation for demographers. The decline also marks the end of a society which was characterized by an ideology of largely rural values which placed stringent restrictions on women in order to secure a vision of society which saw the family as its cornerstone. The article analyses the collective impact of womens battles for personal autonomy which have brought about dramatic changes in public policies about contraception, abortion and divorce, changes which have consistently lagged behind these dramatic shifts in fertility.