Violence affects girls too...

Violence affects many girls, young women, report states
Study cites 'lack of security' -- but groups aim to help
By Joanna Broder Special to the Tribune September 30, 2009


Eighteen-year old Chelsea Whitis tries to forget what happened that night two summers ago. While walking near her family's home in southwest Evanston, a man grabbed her from behind and dragged her into a nearby alley. He ran off when a car turned into the alley.

Now a senior at Lane Technical High School in Chicago's North Center neighborhood, Whitis keeps memories of the attack bottled up inside. She hasn't had any professional assistance to help her cope.

"I just feel like I'm never going to be safe," she said. "I'm so close to my house and I get attacked. ... I never feel safe."

A report released earlier this month found that many girls in Chicago and Illinois "face serious violence in their lives," including physical and sexual abuse, threats and injury in school, and assault on the streets. The report, "Status of Girls in Illinois," -- notes that 10.7 percent of girls in Chicago's high schools skipped school in 2007 because of safety concerns -- nearly double the national average of 5.6 percent -- and that "many girls also report a pervasive feeling of threat and lack of security."

The report pulls together existing survey data about girls in Chicago and Illinois and makes recommendations about a variety of development, health and wellness issues such as access to health care, mental and emotional health, sexuality, safety and substance abuse. It also found that depression and other forms of mental illness pose a serious health issue for area girls.

The report, released Sept. 10, draws mostly from well-known national surveys, including the 2007 Youth Risk Behavior Surveillance System survey of more than 14,000 high school students from across the country. That survey asks about students' sexual behavior, tobacco and alcohol use and other risky behaviors. It also includes statistics from the 2007 National Survey of Children's Health, which said there are more than 1.5 million girls age 17 and younger in Illinois.

Alida Bouris, an assistant professor in the school of social service administration at the University of Chicago, called the report "ambitious." Bouris, who specializes in how parents can influence their children's sexual behavior, said the report shows that overall most girls in Illinois are doing well, but some are developing key health issues in adolescence and young adulthood that have long-term effects for their health and well-being.

Melissa Spatz, the executive director of Women & Girls Collective Action Network, the lead group behind the report, said that nonprofit groups serving girls need the type of statistics outlined in the report when applying for funding, but lack the time or manpower to find them.

"We wanted to gather this information in one place and put it out there so that it could impact policy; it could impact funding," Spatz said. The network, which helps women and girls develop leadership skills, led the collaboration of at least 30 area groups in producing the report.

In response to the violence girls face, the report recommends that policymakers pay closer attention to the stories that girls can share about their experiences.

Whitis, who was assaulted but not raped that night two years ago, belongs to the Rogers Park Young Women's Action Team, a group of girls ages 11 to 21 that came together in 2003 with the goal of raising awareness about street harassment and domestic violence.

In 2007, 36.9 percent of young women in Chicago's high schools said they had been depressed in the last year. More than a third (36.1 percent) of girls across the state who said they needed mental health care did not get any type of treatment.

Lisa Machoian, who has a doctoral degree in psychology and wrote the book "The Disappearing Girl: Learning the Language of Teenage Depression," said the high rates of adolescent depression in Illinois resonate with what she sees in her clinical practice in Cambridge, Mass., where she treats girls and young women who have anxiety, depression and low self-esteem.

Beatrice, 19, who asked that only her middle name be used, was on a self-described path toward prison given the way she acted out as a youth. She once knocked out two of a boy's teeth when he refused to let her ride his scooter. Beatrice found her way to clinical services at Alternatives Inc. when she was 9. The center, on Chicago's North Side, serves the emotional health and development of young women. Since then, she and her family have received free counseling services. Her mother's meager health insurance coverage would have made it difficult, if not impossible, to get therapy elsewhere, she said.

Today, Beatrice, a college student, has learned how to express her feelings through words and not aggression. She has become a resident adviser at Northern Illinois University and a youth leader at Alternatives Inc., where she talks to other girls about issues of social justice and police brutality.

Spatz said she hopes that for all the problems highlighted in the report, it also conveys how, when girls get opportunities to overcome the challenges they face, they often thrive. The report profiles programs for adolescent girls throughout the city that are helping to make a difference in their lives. One such program, Girls in the Game, provides girls ages 7 to 18 the chance to play sports, develop leadership skills and learn to have a healthy lifestyle. "If you work on their strengths, it very much helps girls blossom," Machoian said.

The report is available online at statusofgirls.womenandgirlscan.org.


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