In recent years families have been, for better or for worse, changing drastically. New complexions of families have emerged - single-mom families, single parents with either mom- or dad-only, stepparents and step siblings from previous marriages - with definitions including a variety of structures.

According to the Annie E. Casey KIDS COUNT data book for 1994, 25.1 percent of children in the United States live in single-parent families, up from 22.7 percent in 1985.

This spring, Project XL held a contest for Indiana high school students, to answer the question of what holds families together. Finalists presented their answers using one of six categories: writing, video production, poster design, original music, fine art or performance.

Children's Express spoke with some of these teens who had thoughtfully prepared their responses for this annual competition sponsored by Farm Bureau Insurance.

WHAT MAKES A FAMILY

JEFF JONES, 18: I think a family is just a group of people, that, along with love, (have) a special kind of bond that you don't see with everybody on the street. I mean, you have a family in a sports team. In any family there is a certain type of bond that keeps you together and helps you support each other.

ALAN CRAIG, 17: (A family is), a relationship between two or more people who are related in some way and are willing to spend time with one another and share feelings and emotions with one another. And really love another.

I think it's time that people stop and realize it is not who's in the family that makes it, it's what you put into it.

I am living proof that it doesn't take a mother and a father in the home to make a family. Because my mother was divorced when I was at an early age, when I was around 10. Since (then I've) gotten a stepfather and everything is peachy again.

DANIEL BRANAUN, 17: I think in today's world it's becoming less and less of a chance that you're going to have a four-member family. . . . I think that now, the basics of the family haven't changed and they never will. The only thing that has changed is the appearance of the family.

KATHYRN VOSS, 16: A family doesn't have to be a little nuclear unit. It can be anyone as long as there's love and support and they're willing to sacrifice for each other.

ALAN: I think living life alone would be hard, everyone needs a family. I think human beings need and desire, whether or not they admit it, they need love and compassion and someone that they can lean on when they're feeling blue.

CHRIS BARNES, 17: Family is the basic unit of today's society. And, especially today with how society is, you know, with drugs, AIDS, things like that, it's important to keep the basic structure strong to keep our society strong.

JEFF: My extended family has played a big part in my life. I've had different influences from my grandparents, my uncles. Overall, I include most anyone I come in contact with repeatedly as my family.

CARA LINSMEYER, 17: I don't think there's any such thing as a typical family. . . . There are so many different combinations of people, with people getting divorces and remarriages and extended families. I think the family is starting to go back in the right direction.

HOW FAMILY AFFECTS INDIVIDUAL

KATHRYN: Our families, they teach us so much. They mold us into who we are. They give us morals and they help us, I mean, they help us learn and grow. They influence so much of our lives, even though we don't realize it.

JANETTE: (My family) encourages me and supports me in everything, and have always been there whenever I needed them, even when I do silly things. . . . Families are important because most of the problems that we have in the society goes (back) to the family, what's wrong with the family. If they don't have a foundation in the family, then there's going to (be) problems in society.

JENNIFER: They give me confidence and without them I probably wouldn't have any confidence in anything.

CARA: My family's influence on me is pretty big, I mean, that's where I learned all my morals and values, the way that I should be.

JEFF: They have prepared me to the best of their abilities to help me try to form that perfect family that everyone wants to have, with my own family later on. They've kind of implanted the work ethic in me.

WHAT HOLDS FAMILY

JANETTE LUU, 18: Love and respect. It doesn't matter who does the loving and the respecting as long as members of the family have that.

ALAN: All there really needs to be is love.

JENNIFER: Love, communication, trust, and all that.

JANETTE: The little things, just a little note on the table, a pat on the back.

EVERLASTING FAMILIES

ALAN: I think it is wonderful if it can be everlasting, but in most cases, unfor- tunately, it isn't. I think that's fine, but I think you can make it everlasting in other ways. . . . I think you can find ways to keep in touch, but if it comes to the point where you have to say goodbye as far as living with each other, then I think that's the best choice.

CHRIS: Families definitely should be everlasting, 'cause all through your life your going to have problems and it's always easier to get through those problems when someone who loves you and cares about you. People need a constant, we have constant stability throughout their lives.

CARA: I think families should be everlasting. . . . I don't think that there's anything that you could ever do or any of your family could ever do that would make you not love them.

FAMILY TRADITIONS

KATHRYN: I think family traditions are important. They give you a sense of your family and the people before you who were part of your family.

JEFF: I think traditions are important. I know they are to my family. . . . It seems like now the big goal is to break tradition, . . . do something different, be creative.

CARA: I think tradition is really important because a family can't know where it's going if it doesn't know where it's been and where the roots are.

IF I COULD . . .

ALAN: I like my family just the way it is, but if there is something that I could change, it's that we wouldn't have to be so busy all the time. That we could find more time to visit with each other. . . . If I could change one thing, it's that we could at least make one day for each other.

KATHRYN: I don't think I would change my family. If I did it would be that we communicate better. Because sometimes there's lack of communication and things get mixed up.

CHRIS: People are becoming individualistic and people are realizing that they can do things themselves . . . whereas before you had to work in the family, the whole family had to clear the place for you to live, farm the garden, get the food and everybody had the chores of the family. But now we have advanced our society and we don't need to do things like that.

ALAN: I think it's all there, of course, the ingredients of a family, but things have changed as far as having time for each other. . . . I think that everyone would like to think that their family is the "ideal" family but of course that's not possible. . . . You know Dan Quayle's theory - you should have a mother and a father - that's the way that he was raised, and I guess that's the way he's going to believe.

JEFF: I think the ideal family would be one that could communicate . . . be open about any of the problems they have. Also, spend a lot of time, quality time, together.

ALAN: The days of Donna Reed and Ward Cleaver are long since gone, so I don't think there's an ideal family. Every family is unique in its own way.

KATHYRYN: There is no really ideal family, I mean, the grass is always greener on the other side. So, you just have to learn to accept your families even though sometimes you don't like what they do or disagree with them. You just have to learn to get along and compromise.

JEFF: I think with the innovations of modern technology, we've definitely gone away from the past traditions, spending less time together as a unit. I think in the future it's really going to be an extreme.

EDITED BY: Aaron Shackelford, 15