South African street children: A survey and recommendations for services

Figures & data

Table 1: Demographic details of the 305 children interviewed

	Number	Percentage
Number of street children who said they are South African citizens	233	76.4
Number of male street children	284	93.1
Race of street children
Black	297	97.4
Coloured	6	2.0
Marital status
Married	1	0.3
Never married	301	98.7
Current sleeping arrangements
On street	230	75.4
In shelter	12	3.9
In park	28	9.2
With friends or associates	2	0.7
Other	33	10.8
If living on street
Has no permanent home	82	26.9
Is temporarily stranded	33	10.8
Lives too far away to commute	185	60.7
Other	4	1.3
Number of street children who themselves have children	9 (5 male, 4 female)	3.0
Number of children the street children have	6 reported 1 child, 1 reported 3 children

Figure 1: Age and sex distribution of the 305 children in the sample

Figure 2: Years children had lived on the streets

Table 2: Highest level of education (completed grades) by age

	Age						Total
	12 years	13 years	14 years	15 years	16 years	17 years
No schooling	0	0	0	0	0	4	4
Sub A or Grade 1	0	0	1	0	0	0	1
Sub B or Grade 2	1	1	0	0	0	1	3
Grade 3 or Standard 1	1	0	3	1	2	3	10
Grade 4 or Standard 2	3	0	2	0	3	5	13
Grade 5 or Standard 3	6	4	4	6	7	5	32
Grade 6 or Standard 4	2	8	4	5	9	11	39
Grade 7 or Standard 5	1	2	6	10	11	21	51
Grade 8 or Standard 6 or Form 1	1	5	6	10	10	16	48
Grade 9 or Standard 7 or Form 2	0	0	3	6	9	21	39
Grade 10 or Standard 8 or Form 3	0	0	0	3	7	21	31
Grade 11 or Standard 9 or Form 4	0	0	0	1	4	23	28
Grade 12 or Standard 10 or Form 5 or Matric	0	0	0	0	1	4	5
Diploma or certificate with Grade 12 or Standard 10	0	0	0	0	0	1	1
Total	15	20	29	42	63	136	305
Boxed cells indicate normal age for grade; bold figures and shaded cells indicate over age for grade.