Lived Experience of Children on the Implementation of Curfew Introduction

Introduction:

A curfew is an order specifying a time during which certain regulations apply typically it refers to the time when
individuals are required to return to and stay in their homes. Such an order may be issued by public authorities but also by the
head of a household to those living in the household. For instance, an au pair girl is typically given a curfew, which regulates
when she must return to the host family's home in the evening. The curfew laws mean to restrict kids under the age of 18 off
the streets and away from gangs, drugs and crime. Curfews, which apply to the nighttime hours, aren’t just there to keep the
good kids from going bad, they are also there to keep the good kids from being hurt or becoming victims of crime. Curfews have
also been used to target certain groups in a discriminatory manner. For example, curfews were imposed on Japanese-American
university students on the West Coast during World War II and African-Americans in many towns during the time of Jim Crow
laws. Curfew laws are a general deterrence strategy aimed at reducing crime and victimization in the overall population of
juveniles. That is, reduced opportunity to commit crimes should translate into committing fewer crimes (Wilson et al. 2016).
From a theoretical perspective, curfews are primarily designed to prevent crime and violence by keeping juveniles away from
delinquent opportunities. They are viewed by some as part of a more vigorous law-enforcement effort, and by others as
identifying juveniles in early stages of delinquency and providing them with an opportunity for intervention programs.
However, juvenile curfew laws have been the subject of numerous legal challenges. The Safe Hours for Children Act prohibits
parents or guardians from letting children loiter, roam around, or sleep in any public place from 10pm to 5am without lawful
purpose or justifiable reason. It aims to ensure the safety and self-esteem of children, prevent them from being used to commit
crime, and protect them from abuse and exploitation. Based on Philippine law, individuals below the age of 18 are considered
minors or children. Under the measure, parents or guardians of children violating the Act for the third time or succeeding
offences shall pay a fine of P500 to P1,000 or render community service for five to 10 days, or both.5. National Police Chief
Ronald "Bato" de la Rosa Drug lords use minors in their activities because these children get away lightly unlike adults who get
punished drastically and are fined heavily. The Juvenile Justice Act of 2006, that Sen. Francis Pangilinan sponsored, states that
minors who commit and participate in crimes will not receive any jail sentence for their acts but are to be taken under the
custody of the government through the Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD). The PNP chief said the law is
also a “source of frustration” because it gives protection to juvenile delinquents. De la Rosa recounted his experience as a
police chief in Davao City when a drug lord used minors to deliver drugs in exchange for money for playing video games.

Methodology

Research Design:

This is a qualitative study which made use of phenomenological approach to gather relevant data. The qualitative
approach focuses on the children’s lived with regard to the implementation of curfew. The aim of such method is not to
generalize but to understand and interpret the meanings and intention of the state. This approach is appropriate for this study
because the data collected and used focuses on the participant subjective on the result of the implementation.

Research Setting

This study will be conducted at San Roque, Sogod Sothern leyte. This Barangay were selected as the study sites to know
how many students. The ordinance (Curfew) of Municipality of sogod through their experiences.

Sampling Procedure
 Prior to the collection of data, the research used a simple random sampling for the lived experience of children on the
implementation of curfew. Wherein the researcher chose 20 participants in Barangay San Roque.

Data collection

The researcher used an interview guide as lived questions relate to their experience in relating the implementation of
curfew in Barangay San Roque. The main data gathering instrument for this study was an interview guide which contains the
interview protocol, interview, interview questions, ranking exercises and informed consent ( Boyce & Neale 2006 ). The
interview questions were constructed in English then translated into Cebuano and was pre-tested afterwards. Field rates were
taken during the interviews. Consent to audio record their answers during the interview was asked from the informants. A
cellphone records was used to audio record the interviews. The interviews in the local dialect of the informants were later
transcribed word for word and encoded in the form of written document.

Ethical Considerations

After the approached participants agreed to participate, informed consent was first sought from them. This was
achieved by reading with the participants both informed consents of participants and asking them to sign in order to grant their
consent. Participants were informed of the confidentiality clause. Confidentially implies that dequity of a subject should be
respected. Therefore, it was important that participants had to doubt that any identifying information provided would be
regarded confidential (Ferreira et al. 1998). Real name of the participants was privately not stated. After the study has been
completed, record audio would be certainly deleted.