They Still Pick Me Up When I Fall: The Role of Caring in Youth Development and Community Life / Edition 1

by Diana Mendley Rauner

Overview

This book is a call to action to parents, youth workers, policymakers—anyone who works for and worries about the next generation—to recognize and promote the values of caring in public and private life. It is about teenagers—those who no longer need the care given to babies and children but who still need support and guidance. Diana Mendley Rauner offers a rare focus on youth development as a process of experiencing care and learning social responsibility.

Much public discussion of youth focuses on individual achievement and a limited set of markers of success, on the one hand, and increasingly punitive responses to failure on the other. Missing from these discussions is an appreciation for the importance of caring and social responsibility both in the environments we create for young people and in our expectations of how they should act and what they should become.

"They Still Pick Me Up When I Fall" develops ideals for caring interaction, articulating specific behaviors and habits for practitioners as well as policies and practices that characterize caring organizations and caring societies. Each chapter begins with a profile of a youth-serving organization, drawn from the fields of education, youth work, and counseling. Throughout, an intellectual framework for care is interwoven with the voices and experiences of the youth workers and young people involved in the struggle to create a caring society.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780231118552
Publisher:	Columbia University Press
Publication date:	09/26/2000
Edition description:	New Edition
Pages:	224
Product dimensions:	5.90(w) x 8.90(h) x 0.50(d)
Lexile:	1420L (what's this?)
Age Range:	18 Years

About the Author

Diana Mendley Rauner is a senior research associate at Chapin Hall Center for Children at the University of Chicago.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgements
1: Caring for Youth : A Call to Action; Finding Words, An Ethic of Care, Beginning the Inquiry
2: The Practice of Care; A Model of Care: Attentiveness, Responsiveness, and Competence; Care: A Habit of Action; The Cultural Content of Care
3: Mutuality, Trust and Boundaries; The Mutuality of Caring, Trust: The Foundation of Care, Boundaries: Protecting Youth and Protecting, Care as the Context for Change and Growth
4: Learning to Care; The Role of Expectations and Social Norms, The Role of Instruction, Modeling and Competence, Continuity and Turning Points in Development, The Impact of Youth Community Service
5: But What Does Caring "Accomplish"?; Care as a Protective Factor, Caring in the Classroom, Special Relationships: The Impact of Mentoring, Measuring Care: Valuing the Process
6: Sustaining Care: Caring Schools and Other Organizations; Providing Care Beyond the Family, What is a Caring Organization?, Caring by Design: Organizational Practices, Reaching Beyond the Walls: Practices that Create Connections in Young People's Lives
7: Building a Caring Community; Extending the Practice of Care, Trust as a Moral Source, The Challenge of Caring in Public
8: Reinventing Care in Public Life; Care as a Social Norm, Opportunities for Caring, Beginning the Journey
Notes
Selected Bibliography

What People are Saying About This

Lisbeth B. Schorr

If Robert Putnam has established that we bowl alone today, Diana Rauner establishes that we could bowl together tomorrow. In 'They Still Pick Me Up When I Fall' she shows how we can build caring into our civic dialogue, professional practices, and public life. Rauner's book brings us closer to realizing her dream of a society in which caring is the norm, not only in personal relationships, but also in schools and the other institutions that help guide young people on the journey into adulthood. With its gripping stories of caring in action, this is a must-read for everyone concerned about the depersonalization of life in the twenty-first century.

— Lisbeth B. Schorr, author of Within Our Reach: Breaking the Cycle of Disadvantage

Emmy E. Werner

Rauner asks us to think seriously about the role of caring in our own lives and those of the next generation. She documents the positive impact of three components of caring behavior -- attentiveness, responsiveness, and competence -- on the lives of adolescents in individual face-to-face interactions, in the professional work of teachers, counselors, service providers, and supervisors, in organizations that sustain care, and in caring communities.... 'They Still Pick Me Up When I Fall'deserves a wide audience.

— Emmy E. Werner, author of Vulnerable but Invincible and Overcoming the Odds

William Ayers

'They Still Pick Me Up When I Fall' rescues the concept of 'caring'from its sentiments and its clichéd hard times, offering a muscular and activist alternative to what has too often become an empty gesture in our work with youth. Diana Mendley Rauner effectively constructs a politics of caring from the complex world of successful youth programs, and demonstrates practically how our work with kids must be linked to dialogue, community-building, and social justice. She captures the intellectual and ethical heart of youth work.

— William Ayers, author of A Kind and Just Parent

Editorial Reviews

Heady, realistic, and serious.

Youthworker

'They Still Pick Me Up When I Fall´ rescues the concept of 'caring´ from its sentiments and its clichéd hard times, offering a muscular and activist alternative to what has too often become an empty gesture in our work with youth. Diana Mendley Rauner effectively constructs a politics of caring from the complex world of successful youth programs, and demonstrates practically how our work with kids must be linked to dialogue, community-building, and social justice. She captures the intellectual and ethical heart of youth work.

William Ayers

Rauner asks us to think seriously about the role of caring in our own lives and those of the next generation. She documents the positive impact of three components of caring behavior -attentiveness, responsiveness, and competence -on the lives of adolescents in individual face-to-face interactions, in the professional work of teachers, counselors, service providers, and supervisors, in organizations that sustain care, and in caring communities. . . . 'They Still Pick Me Up When I Fall´ deserves a wide audience.

Emmy E. Werner

If Robert Putnam has established that we bowl alone today, Diana Rauner establishes that we could bowl together tomorrow. In 'They Still Pick Me Up When I Fall´ she shows how we can build caring into our civic dialogue, professional practices, and public life. Rauner´s book brings us closer to realizing her dream of a society in which caring is the norm, not only in personal relationships, but also in schools and the other institutions that help guide young people on the journey into adulthood. With its gripping stories of caring in action, this is a must-read for everyone concerned about the depersonalization of life in the twenty-first century.

Lisbeth B. Schorr

The author's message throughout and her contextually-sensitive discussion about care is a valuable one. Social scientists buried under statistics (like me would do well to integrate the term care into our research, attempt its measurement, and study its influence, not to mention practice and advocate it.

Mark D. Regnerus

Intended for parents, social workers, teachers, and others, this volume discusses what it means to care for young people at all levels of social interaction: as individuals, in a professional capacity, within an organization, and as a society. Chapters address themes including the practice of care; mutuality, trust, and boundaries; learning to care; what caring accomplishes; sustaining care in organizations; building a caring community; and reinventing care in public life. The author's credentials are not provided. Annotation c. Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)

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