Icelandic youth policy

[Skids]

You meet some interesting characters in the FIFO life, especially while having a brew awaiting your delayed flight.

Last night, sitting around a table at the Port Headland airport, with a bunch of my new work colleagues, having a few beers and sharing some wedges, I met a very interesting gent.

Daniel Prokop - Australias only stand up geologist. He's an author, speaker, geologist & stand up comic.
While the rest of us were knocking back a few, this guy was sitting there, still in his hi-vis uniform, a coffee in one hand and a novel in the other.

We touched on many subjects and one thing was todays youth and the spiralling drug problems we too often see. Another thing Daniel is involved in is the pathways foundation - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pathways_Foundation

He brought up the way that Iceland have reacted to solving the issue at the root source, rather than the reactive way that most of the world deal with the issue.

People don't put enough time or effort into their kids. They're quick to drop them at a child minding centre and leave the upbringing of their kids to complete strangers. They come up with all sorts of weak excuses to warrant doing so.

I'll touch on Daniel a bit more in my FIFO thread, but this one subject is very interesting.... could it work or even have any chance of being implemented here, or do we just continue down the same (ineffective) path we've been walking?

Iceland knows how to stop teen substance abuse - but the rest of the world isn’t listening


It’s a little before three on a sunny Friday afternoon and Laugardalur Park, near central Reykjavik, looks practically deserted. There’s an occasional adult with a pushchair, but the park’s surrounded by apartment blocks and houses, and school’s out – so where are all the kids?

Walking with me are Gudberg Jónsson, a local psychologist, and Harvey Milkman, an American psychology professor who teaches for part of the year at Reykjavik University. Twenty years ago, says Gudberg, Icelandic teens were among the heaviest-drinking youths in Europe. “You couldn’t walk the streets in downtown Reykjavik on a Friday night because it felt unsafe,” adds Milkman. “There were hordes of teenagers getting in-your-face drunk.”

We approach a large building. “And here we have the indoor skating,” says Gudberg.

A couple of minutes ago, we passed two halls dedicated to badminton and ping pong. Here in the park, there’s also an athletics track, a geothermally heated swimming pool and – at last – some visible kids, excitedly playing football on an artificial pitch.

Young people aren’t hanging out in the park right now, Gudberg explains, because they’re in after-school classes in these facilities, or in clubs for music, dance or art. Or they might be on outings with their parents.

Today, Iceland tops the European table for the cleanest-living teens. The percentage of 15- and 16-year-olds who had been drunk in the previous month plummeted from 42 per cent in 1998 to 5 per cent in 2016. The percentage who have ever used cannabis is down from 17 per cent to 7 per cent. Those smoking cigarettes every day fell from 23 per cent to just 3 per cent.

The way the country has achieved this turnaround has been both radical and evidence-based, but it has relied a lot on what might be termed enforced common sense. “This is the most remarkably intense and profound study of stress in the lives of teenagers that I have ever seen,” says Milkman. “I’m just so impressed by how well it is working.”

Laws were changed. It became illegal to buy tobacco under the age of 18 and alcohol under the age of 20, and tobacco and alcohol advertising was banned. Links between parents and school were strengthened through parental organisations which by law had to be established in every school, along with school councils with parent representatives. Parents were encouraged to attend talks on the importance of spending a quantity of time with their children rather than occasional “quality time”, on talking to their kids about their lives, on knowing who their kids were friends with, and on keeping their children home in the evenings.

A law was also passed prohibiting children aged between 13 and 16 from being outside after 10pm in winter and midnight in summer. It’s still in effect today.


www.abc.net.au/triplej/programs/hack/iceland-teen-substance-abuse/8208214

https://www.huffingtonpost.com/harvey-b-milkman-phd/iceland-succeeds-at-rever_b_9892758.html

[think positive]

i agree with sooo much of that!

one thing for sure is so many parents in my age group dont know the difference between want and need. and the kids suffer.

cant believe that law is needed, in our day we just lived by the streetlight law - they came on, you were home, except maybe saturday night.

im still shocked how many parents drop their kids off for a netball game and come back 40 min later - sad.

[stui magpie]

I agree with a lot of it, some like age limits on booze and smokes and no cigarette advertising we've already done.

The bit about brain chemistry and kids wanting to alter it was interesting. I maintain that those fkn energy drinks are a gateway to Ice for kids who have a need for stimulants.

Agree on the curfew, no reason for 13-16 year olds to be out after 10pm without their parents IMHO on week nights.

On TP's comment about dropping kids off at Netball, sometimes parents have other things to do.

I was having a beer with an old high school mate over Xmas. We were comparing notes about how often either of our parents saw us play junior footy, the answer for both of us was never. At 12 years old, playing under 14's footy, for away games you'd walk by yourself to the designated point about 8am on a freezing winter Saturday and wait for a parent who was driving their kid to the game to swing past and give you a lift. Hopefully.
Sometimes it would just be an adult, so you'd jump in a car with someone you didn't know and let them drive you between 20 to 70km away, then hope like hell in the days of no mobile phones that they remembered to give you a lift home.

Getting kids involved in organised sport is a good idea, parents spending time with them is also good, but you can't force that. Many kids hit their teens and would rather cap themselves than be seen in public with their parents.

[think positive]

footy takes a couple of hours, junior netball is just 40 min. and if i had had a footy player, i would have been watching all their games too! priorities.

[Dave The Man]

Because there no money to be made most likely

[stui magpie]

[think positive]

Working is a legitimate priority. popping down the road for a coffee isnt. they drink coffee and the same muggins mums umpire every week too!

[ronrat]

I know quite a few Icelandic folk who holiday and live here. They all love drinking, heavy metal and the wild side of life. handy in a fight as well. That sais once you get to know them they are friendly and have a drier wit than the swedes and Germans e6c but they do have a deep respect for family, Not uncommon for Mum and Dad to come out out for 6 week holiday and stay in the sons house and oretty much fit in. You could have 15 bar girls dancing naked on the bar and much more but Mumma will just sit there and talk to whoever with out batting an eyelid, They do people on what they do and say and not what they are expected to do. Non judgemental. I like them.