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Throughout this book is shown how important it is to have two parents or guardians in your life. A main character named Tanner has a father that is in jail and hasn't been in his life very much. This indirectly leads to him stealing for his family. He doesn't know that it isn't wrong because his father wasn't there to teach him. Jenna who is the other main character also isn't in touch with her father. She has some struggles about the fact that her father left.

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Tanner Cobb, one of the main characters in this book helps show that it is important to have two fully involved parents. Tanner steals for his family because they are very poor. Mrs. Gladstone said, "'Tanner, I have a feeling you've done this before '". He replied "'Once or twice... you know..."'(Bauer 14)

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Single parenthood in the real world is a huge issue for kids and even for the adults. All of the following are statistics about children with single parents "63% of youth suicides, 80% of rapists motivated with displaced anger, 71% of high school dropouts, 75% of adolescent patients in chemical abuse centers, and 85% of all youths in prison" (Ahlberg 2). These statistics show that kids without both parents involved in their life have a higher chance of breaking the law, and being depressed.

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The other main character in this book, Jenna, hasn't seen her dad in years. He is an alcoholic and left their family when she was young. She struggles with the fact that he left. Jenna attends a therapy group of people that have alcoholic parents and talk about it. She works at a shoe store

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In the beginning of the book Jenna is very shy in the therapy group, the first few times she doesn't say anything. By the end of the book she is helping people feel welcome that are just like she was. Jenna said Jenna had completely turned around since coming to therapy "I'd been taking new people under my wing these days" (Bauer 182-183).

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A large cause of this issue is people having children out of wedlock. A large majority of single parents are people that had a kid before marriage. The single parent rate in the U.S. has been going up steadily shown by the chart below. Part of this is because the government has created a safety net for these people. This just leads us to believe that it is less of a big deal to have kids out of wedlock.

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"From 1960 to 2015, the percentage of single mothers went from 5% all the way up to 41%" (Elder "Black Fathers Matter"). During slavery when marriage between black people was illegal, black children had a higher chance of being raised by both parents than now (Elder "Black Fathers matter").

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Which poses a bigger threat to black communities: Racism? Or the absence of fathers? Drawing on a sea of official data and his own upbringing, talk-show host Larry Elder shows just how important black fathers are in turning boys into responsible and happy men--and how their absence has had a tragic impact on millions of black Americans.

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Lib.Post.Ca.Gov, 2017, http://lib.post.ca.gov/Publications/Building%20a%20Career%20Pipeline%20Documents/Safe_Harbor.pdf.

Rector, Robert. "How Welfare Undermines Marriage And What To Do About It." The Heritage Foundation, 2017, http://www.heritage.org/welfare/report/how-welfare-undermines-marriage-and-what-do-about-it.

"Black Fathers Matter." Youtube, 2017, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FszQelEQ2KY.

Bauer, Joan. Best Foot Forward. G.P. Putnam's Sons, 2006.

Garden, Home, and Single Parents. "Does Single Parenting Affect Children?." Howstuffworks, 2010, https://lifestyle.howstuffworks.com/family/parenting/single-parents/single-parenting-affect-children.htm.