‘Modern Micronesian teens face too much competition’

In the olden days, at least in the time of the Trust Territory government of Micronesia, young people were primarily influenced, molded, and shaped by three main factors: school, home, and church. Back then, Micronesia had a much more homogenized society and its traditional culture was more intact.

Even then, young people still got into trouble. Gov. Benigno R. Fitial said teenagers would get into fights and sometimes had trouble with the law. In school, children did not always do their homework or excel at academics.

“In this modern age, we still face many of the same challenges regarding our youth population…but our modern society is much more complicated, with more diversions for young people,” Fitial said, speaking at Monday’s kickoff of the 5th Micronesian Youth Services Network regional conference.

Citing challenges brought by modern technology—cell phones, computers, iPods, and video games—the governor said today’s teenagers are also influenced by Western and international cultures, brought about by globalization and the proliferation of mass media.

“The modern Micronesian teenager of today has so many choices and so many competing media interests. And the influences of the home, the school and the church may not be quite as strong as before. There is too much competition now,” the governor said.

Yet despite these changes and challenges facing Micronesian youths, the social and policy goals for the youth remain the same, he said.

“We want to cultivate healthy, happy, creative, and productive young people to build stronger societies and communities throughout our entire region. We want our kids to be educated and respectful of our sacred values and traditions, but we also don’t want them to be left behind in our modern world,” Fitial said.

These are the concerns of the regional conference, he said, to encourage everyone to share ideas and work together to support valuable services to the youth of the region, so that policy objectives might be better achieved.

‘Sustainable communities’

To achieve strong communities for the youths, Sarah M. Thomas-Nededog, president of the Micronesian Youth Services Network, said there must be focus on each and every youth.

“The academic definition [of sustainable communities] dictates that if we want to have a sustainable community, we must address three factors: equity, environment and economics. None can be achieved without the other,” she said.

Thomas-Nededog said that Micronesians are being challenged in their ability to manage lives, finances, governments and private sector.

She said a fruit of a sustainable community is the practice of equity, which averts displacement of children and youth, the homeless, persons with disabilities, homeless and the poor, as well as the hardworking middle class.

“We have people who are fearful each waking day if they will be abused or neglected. We have youth who do not wake up because they have gone to sleep fueled by some drug, which gives them reprieve from what to them is a very cruel world,” she said.

She said it is the event’s objective to strengthen the Micronesian communities—one youth at a time.