An overflow audience gathered at the Kennedy School of Government's ARCO Forum last night to hear a panel of experts, policy wonks and concerned community leaders speak on the topic: "America's Children: Who Cares?"

They watched videotaped responses by Boston area children to three questions: What do you do when you're not in school? Who do you talk to when you're mad or sad? What do adults need to know about kids?

One youth replied, "Adults were kids once, too. Let us grow up. Let us make our mistakes. We'll pay for them."

Another demanded, "Kids need to be listened to, not preached at."

Paul C. O'Brien, president of The O'Brien Group and member of the Board of Directors of the United Way of Massachusetts Bay, said he thinks children share several universal needs and desires.

They need to feel respected and want adults to listen to them and communicate with them, he said. They seek room to grow and tolerance on the part of adults to provide the freedom necessary for children to learn on their own.

Finally, O'Brien said, they must be instilled with "a sense of purpose, high standards and, above all, hope."

O'Brien pointed to the breakdown of both the nuclear and extended family as the number one problem facing youth.

Respondents included Professor of Afro-American Studies and Philosophy K. Anthony Appiah, Boston Police Commissioner Paul F. Evans, Christopher Lydon, host of "The Connection" on WBUR-FM, Margarita Muniz, principal of the Rafael Hernandez School, Dr. Gloria White-Hammond, co-pastor of Bethel A.M.E. Church and pediatrician, O'Brien and moderator Martha Minow, professor at Harvard Law School.

Appiah identified his relationship with children as an uncle and godfather. Raised in Ghana within a community of family members, Appiah said he could be mad at his parents but still have adults to whom he could turn.

Appiah said he's non-parenting adult who extends his love and protection to his "adopted" children, a relationship that is quickly fading away in America.

He outlined two distressing trends in the cultural context of children: the complete privatization of middleclass childhood and the problem of parents who proclaim that they are the only role models for their children, preventing other adults from becoming role models.