ATTENTION: Human rights, international, social welfare and immigration reporters and editors

WHAT: A conference at the University of California, Berkeley, about "Children in Crisis," hosted by the campus' Center for Urban Ethnography. Experts from universities in the U.S. and the United Kingdom will present their findings about children struggling in Africa, the Middle East, South America, Haiti and in this country. The event is free and open to the public.

WHEN: Friday and Saturday, Oct. 30 and 31, 9 a.m.- 4 p.m.

WHERE: Lipman Room, eighth floor of Barrows Hall, UC Berkeley. See campus map.

WHO: Panelists will include:

• Javier Auyero, a professor of Latin American sociology at the University of Texas, Austin. His most recent study is of an impoverished Buenos Aires shantytown and the suffering of residents following environmental damage from Shell Oil's toxic dumping.
• Lewis Aptekar, a professor of counselor education at San Jose State University. He will speak about street children and AIDS orphans in Africa.
• Prudence Carter, an associate professor of education and of sociology at Stanford University. She is currently finishing her book, "The Paradoxes of Opportunity: Race, Culture, and Boundaries in 'Good' Schools," which discusses how school practices can either facilitate or diminish academic and social success for African American students attending integrated schools in the U.S. and South Africa.
• Dawn Chatty, deputy director of the Refugee Studies Centre at Oxford University in England. She will be discussing her research on refugee youth in the Middle East, including the Sahrawi (western Saharan), Palestinian and Afghan youth in Iran.
• Gina Crivello, a researcher at Oxford University’s Department of International Development. She will discuss the experience of poverty-stricken youth in Peru and Ethiopia.
• Joanna Dreby, assistant professor of sociology at Kent State University. She is author of "Divided by Borders: Mexican Migrants and their Children." The book, published by University of California Press, discusses the experiences of the U.S.-born children of Mexican immigrants whose parents have been deported while their children remain in the U.S.
• Philip Kilbride, a professor of anthropology at Bryn Mawr College. His research focuses on children in poverty in Kenya.
• Christopher Kovats-Bernat, an associate professor of anthropology at Muhlenberg College in Pennsylvania. His research examines the experiences of street children in Haiti.

DETAILS: For more information, visit http://cue.berkeley.edu/conference.html.