An Australian study spanning more than 20 years has found interventions targeting preschoolers and their families may be the key to reducing youth crime.
The project, led by prominent Griffith University criminologist Ross Homel, involved seven primary schools and early childhood centres in disadvantaged communities in Brisbane’s south-west.
Professor Homel said of the children who engaged in the communications training, just over 3 per cent went on to commit crimes that required them to appear before the courts by the age of 17.
This was less than half the rate of offending seen among children from the same schools who did not receive the communication training.
“Children from lower socio-economic communities, we know there’s a gap between their readiness for school and the readiness levels of middle-class kids,” he said.
“If we could close that gap between children in these most deprived communities and the middle-class average … we’d be getting very, very, very good outcomes.”
Professor Homel led the project, which spanned over 20 years. (ABC News: Michael Lloyd)
New findings of the Pathways to Prevention Project have recently been published by the Australian Institute of Criminology.
Professor Homel said the study showed how supporting multiple aspects of a child’s development at an early age could lead to improved engagement with school, and possibly lower levels of criminal behaviour later in life.
“The optimal condition for change is to work on all aspects of the growing child’s environment at the same time,” he said.
One part of the initiative, between 2002 and 2011, focused on families having at-home learning support, voluntary counselling and training in child behaviour management from not-for-profit Mission Australia.
And between 2002-2003, specialist early childhood teachers delivered communications training to 214 preschoolers to improve their verbal communication skills.
Researchers reviewed the outcomes of the student and family participants against a comparison group.
The report also found that none of the children who received communication training and engaged with voluntary not-for-profit support services went on to offend as juveniles.
‘Poverty of imagination’
The state government is currently debating the Making Queensland Safer laws, an LNP election promise.
In addition to tougher penalties, the LNP had promised “gold standard early intervention” policies to disrupt the cycle of offending.
Before the election, LNP MP Laura Gerber, the now Minister for Youth Justice, said early intervention schools would support children transitioning from primary to high school.
However, Professor Homel said the evidence showed risk factors for criminal behaviour, including impulsivity and antisocial attitudes, were already entrenched in some children before they started high school.
He believed more work needed to be done to adequately address the issue in Queensland.
“There is a poverty of imagination,” he said.
“From a social policy perspective, it’s incredibly more cost-effective to do this sort of work early in life [and] to do it within a social justice population health framework so you’re not singling out kids who are already in serious trouble.”
Ms Gerber did not respond to questions from the ABC about the recent study, the location of the proposed early intervention schools or the time frame for their delivery.
Laura Gerber says the LNP’s proposed early intervention schools will support students transitioning from primary to high school. (ABC News)
Early childhood educator shortages
University of Queensland researcher Karen Thorpe said the study was the first in Australia to track the outcomes of early childhood interventions over multiple decades.
She also said it was “unique” because it built on existing services rather than imposing academic systems on the community.
“It’s a positive message — we can make a difference, we go early and we prevent youth crime,” Professor Thorpe said.
“You’ve got to have governments buying into that and understanding that intervention early is really, really important.”
However, Professor Thorpe said the current shortage of skilled early childhood educators was too high to support the delivery of more communications training throughout all disadvantaged areas of Queensland.
While acknowledging the federally funded two-year, 15 per cent wage increase for early childhood educators that came into effect last week, Professor Thorpe said conditions needed to improve further to attract more people to the sector.
“To deliver high-quality education and those [social and communications] skills … you’ve got to have highly skilled … and highly motivated educators who are rewarded,” she said.
“At the moment they’re not rewarded.”
The Minister for Education John-Paul Langbroek did not comment on the government’s plans to upskill early childhood educators in alignment with strategies to address youth crime, but said he was “committed to supporting them to set our little learners on the right path”.
A spokesperson for Mr Langbroek confirmed the government would honour its predecessor’s commitment to allocate $120 million over four years to develop the early childhood workforce.
