Tagged With "Racial Disparities in California"
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Thoughts on creating ‘restorative justice’ (modbee.com)
(Image Credit: shellyduffer.com) Restorative justice, which has been in the news lately , includes some interesting concepts about bringing criminals face to face with their victims to show them the impact of their crimes. The theory is that meeting those victims and hearing what they have suffered can lead to conciliation – or a coming to terms about what happened. When it works, restorative justice helps the offender take responsibility for his or her actions, possibly out of remorse or an...
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Too young for juvie? California bill bars prosecution of kids under 12 [SacBee.com]
Sen. Holly Mitchell sits at her desk on the fifth floor of the Capitol and holds up a book. On the cover a small boy in oversized jeans and a Tommy Hilfiger T-shirt stands on a plastic milk crate, too small to reach, as a police officer presses the young child’s ink-soaked fingertips onto a piece of paper. “That image just stuck with me,” Mitchell said. The senator from Los Angeles is pushing a bill through the Legislature that would bar the state from prosecuting children under age 12. In...
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Treating Young Offenders Like Adults Is Bad Parenting [TheAtlantic.com]
Part of the philosophy for creating a separate juvenile-justice system in the United States is the idea that the state can act as a parent, or parens patriae—protector, caretaker, disciplinarian—when a young person fails to respect the rights of others, commits petty or serious crimes, or shirks age-based societal norms by committing so-called status offenses. But parenting is hard. Even for the state. Sometimes the lessons learned with one generation benefit the next. Sometimes cultural...
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Two New Grant Opportunities for Youth Development and Diversion Services
In 2019, more than $40 million will become available to fund community-based, culturally rooted, trauma-informed services for youth in California as alternatives to arrest and incarceration. Thousands of California youth are arrested every year for low-level offenses. Youth who are arrested or incarcerated for low-level offenses are less likely to graduate high school, more likely to suffer negative health-outcomes, and more likely to have later contact with the justice system.
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Webinar: The Human Impact of Climate Change
The Community Resiliency Model Disaster Relief Program Climate change emergencies are real and the human toll during and in the aftermath impact children, teens and adults. This webinar will hear from Kelly Doty, a survivor, who lost her home in Paradise and is working in a community-based program to help the children and their parents in the aftermath. Elaine Miller-Karas, the key developer of the Community Resiliency Model Disaster Relief Program, will explain the program and how it helps...
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Why Does Gavin Newsom Want to Move Juvenile Justice Out of the Department of Corrections? [psmag.com]
While visiting a youth correctional facility in Stockton on Tuesday, California Governor Gavin Newsom announced his administration will begin legislation to move the California Division of Juvenile Justice out of the Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation (the same agency that oversees adult prisons) and into the Health and Human Services Agency. Currently, 20 states place juvenile justice under their health or child welfare agencies, 18 have independent juvenile justice agencies, and...
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Why Does Gavin Newsom Want to Move Juvenile Justice Out of the Department of Corrections? [psmag.com]
While visiting a youth correctional facility in Stockton on Tuesday, California Governor Gavin Newsom announced his administration will begin legislation to move the California Division of Juvenile Justice out of the Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation (the same agency that oversees adult prisons) and into the Health and Human Services Agency. Currently, 20 states place juvenile justice under their health or child welfare agencies, 18 have independent juvenile justice agencies, and...
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Why Silicon Valley is teaming up with San Quentin to train young people to code (usatoday.com)
Inside an aging brick facility ringed by a chain-link fence and agricultural fields, 14 young people convicted of violent crimes are trying to program a better future for themselves. For the past two months they’ve been learning to write code through a first-of-its-kind pilot program at the Ventura Youth Correctional Facility in Camarillo, California, about 50 miles northwest of Los Angeles. They’re looking to break that streets-to-prison cycle by picking up new skills – JavaScript, HTML,...
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Youth Of Merced Use The Power Of Writing To Illuminate The Human Cost Of Incarceration…& Other Urgent Issues [WitnessLA.com]
Earlier this month, an innovative youth program called We’Ced Youth Media, located in Merced, California, co-hosted an event called #SchoolsnotPrisons Merced. The event’s stated purpose was “to educate the Merced community about the impact of the school-to-prison pipeline and mass incarceration.” A portion of the event included poetry that expressed the pain of incarceration, both for the one who is locked-up, and for those who lose a family member to jail or prison. What is particularly...
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A Police Department's Difficult Assignment: Atonement [witnessla.com]
By Michael Friedrich, CityLab, October 27, 2019 Standing before the congregation of the Progressive Community Church of Stockton, California, Eric Jones, the city’s police chief, apologized. It was July 2016, in the furious days after the police shootings of Philando Castile in Falcon Heights, Minnesota, and Alton Sterling in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. Those were followed closely by the deadly ambush of police officers in Dallas, Texas, and in Baton Rouge after protests over the Sterling...
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A Trauma Primer for Juvenile Probation and Juvenile Detention Staff
A Trauma Primer for Juvenile Probation and Juvenile Detention Staff August 12, 2015 Juvenile justice probation and detention workers play an important role in helping system-involved youth and families navigate justice and social service...
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As Newsom rethinks juvenile justice, California reconsiders prison for kids (calmatters.org)
Though it’s not on the parchment, Moreno, 21, earned his Johanna Boss High School diploma over the past two years at a state prison for juveniles in Stockton. And as one of fewer than 800 remaining youths in the custody of the soon-to-be-shuttered juvenile division of the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation, he said, that accomplishment—behind razor wire—was more than just a step toward a future job or a rite of passage. “Being the first one [in the family] to graduate,”...
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Association of Childhood History of Parental Incarceration and Juvenile Justice Involvement With Mental Health in Early Adulthood (JAMA Open Access)
Question Is a childhood history of parental incarceration and juvenile justice involvement associated with mental health conditions in early adulthood? Findings In this nationally representative cross-sectional study, young adults with a history of both parental incarceration and juvenile justice involvement reported more mental health conditions compared with peers with no justice system exposure during childhood. Meaning Parental incarceration and juvenile justice involvement may be...
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Burnout Risk for In-Prison Educators Could Jeopardize Programs for Incarcerated Students
Sustaining Futures will strengthen education programs for incarcerated individuals by training California Community College faculty and staff on trauma and resilience.
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California can curb violence against incarcerated children. Here’s how. (ocregister.com)
When I was 16, I was incarcerated in juvenile hall. Whenever I was moved within the facility, I was shackled. They would chain my ankles and handcuff my wrists to a belly-chain. I was bound like this anytime I went to see the nurse, the psychiatrist and whenever I went outside. Twenty years later, I still have scars where the cuffs carved into my ankles. Policies in California’s youth prisons, including the use of shackles, cause serious harm to our children. The vast majority of...
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California Community Non-profits Get $1.3 Million to Push for Juvenile Justice Policy Change [JJIE.org]
Last week, a group of California-based foundations announced a $1.3 million investment into nonprofit community-based organizations in 11 of the state’s counties, including Los Angeles, through the Positive Youth Justice Initiative. This comes after two previous investments as part of PYJI’s three-phase initiative to eliminate racial disparities and transform the state’s juvenile justice system to better serve California’s vulnerable youth in need of trauma-informed care. This third monetary...
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California Ends Practice of Billing Parents for Kids in Detention [themarshallproject.org]
Gov. Jerry Brown of California signed into law on Wednesday a sweeping package of criminal justice reform bills including a ban on the practice of billing parents for their children’s incarceration, which had been prevalent statewide for decades and was the subject of a Marshall Project investigation earlier this year. The new law — introduced by two Democratic state senators from the Los Angeles area, Holly Mitchell and Ricardo Lara, and approved by the legislature on Sept. 6 — prohibits...
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California Legislature Passes Bill Setting Juvenile Justice Minimum Age at 12 [chronicleofsocialchange.org]
A bill that would largely exclude California youth under the age of 12 from prosecution is now headed to the desk of Gov. Jerry Brown (D) after passing out of both chambers of the state legislature. Senate Bill 439 would direct counties to seek alternatives to the juvenile justice system for children 11 and younger. State Senator Holly Mitchell (D), a co-sponsor of the legislation, hopes that the state could use a new pot of state money aimed at diverting young people from the justice system...
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California would virtually eliminate money bail under proposed legislation (sacbee.com)
California lawmakers have unveiled a sweeping plan to overhaul pretrial release in the state that could virtually eliminate the use of money bail. Sen. Bob Hertzberg, D-Los Angeles, and Assemblyman Rob Bonta, D-Alameda, introduced legislation last December to change a system they argue unfairly punishes the poor by keeping them stuck in custody if they cannot afford expensive bail rates. Updated with new details last Friday, the proposal envisions instead a system of risk assessment to...
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California Wraparound Program Reduces Juvenile Recidivism by Focusing on Mental Health [JJIE.org]
Manuel Dircio, 20, a business administration student at Fullerton College boasts a 4.0 GPA. He is also a recovering alcoholic with a history of arrest and incarceration in juvenile detention — not quite what you’d expect from a seemingly model college student with a stellar grade point. Dircio credits the Youthful Offender Wraparound program (YOW), which he says “helped [him] grow successfully.” It’s what’s known as a full-service partnership (FSP) in Orange County, California, that uses a...
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Charging Youth as Adults has Public Health Impact, Report Says (socialjusticesolutions.org) 56 page report
Advocates in California say that for too long the hazardous health consequences of incarcerating juveniles in the state’s justice system have been obscured by overly punitive rhetoric around public safety. The authors describe a court process that offers few opportunities for youth to deal with childhood trauma that often leads to involvement with the justice system. When it comes to transfers of youth to the adult system, racial disparities are widespread . As a result, they say, high rates...
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Childhood Trauma and Its Effects: Implications for Police
This is important information regarding childhood trauma and policing. Includes reference for:
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Coalition for Juvenile Justice, National Juvenile Justice Network Recognize 5 People [jjie.org]
Both the Coalition for Juvenile Justice and National Juvenile Justice Network are recognizing the people who achieved the most in the past year. The CJJ gives its awards to inspiring individuals who honor its core mission to improve the lives of children, families and communities nationwide. They will be presented this week in Washington, DC, at its annual conference. This year’s Spirit of Youth Award goes to Amanda Clifford of California. It’s given to celebrate young adults under 28 who...
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County Plans To Expand Juvenile Justice Reforms (canyon-news.com)
The Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors unanimously agreed to expand juvenile diversion reforms on Tuesday, January 24 to keep kids out of the criminal justice system. The reforms should be seen as “delinquency prevention” rather than focusing on diversion which assumes that the kids are already part of the criminal justice system, urges criminal defense lawyer and probation commissioner Cyn Yamashiro. Dr. Robert Ross, CEO and president of the nonprofit health foundation California...
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COVID-19 Risks Prompt Some California Counties to Ease Jail Populations [chcf.org]
By Claudia Boyd-Barrett, California Health Care Foundation, April 24, 2020 Many county correctional facilities throughout California are reducing their teeming populations to prevent large-scale COVID-19 outbreaks. The dorm rooms, dining halls, and recreation areas in many of these institutions are breeding grounds for spreading the virus, experts say. People have been complaining for weeks that inmates don’t have hand sanitizer or equipment like masks to protect themselves and that cramped...
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Ella Baker Truth and Reinvestment Justice Teams underway in 8 CA Counties
There are various forms of emergency preparedness for natural disasters. From an early age, one learns how to put out a fire, board up their home if a hurricane or tornado is coming, or drop under a desk if an earthquake hits—but low-income communities of color have little to no response to more frequent incidences of state violence in the streets and inside of jails. The Justice Teams for Truth and Reinvestment will be the local rapid response networks inside of eight different counties...
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Failed Juvenile Justice System Costs California More Than Dollars [JJIE.org]
$271,318 . That’s how much California expects to spend per youth this year on its failed state youth correctional facilities, the Division of Juvenile Justice (DJJ). This amount of money could drastically improve a young person’s education, well-being and development opportunities. To give perspective, a four-year undergraduate education at Stanford University costs approximately $276,000. Instead, the money is being squandered on DJJ’s dangerous and poorly designed facilities, which have...
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GENDER & TRAUMA Somatic Interventions for Girls in Juvenile Justice: Implications for Policy and Practice (40 pages - Georgetown Center on Poverty and Inequality)
The impact of gender on the experience of trauma is less widely discussed, though it is significant in scope. In multiple studies, girls have reported higher rates of adverse childhood experiences than boys in all categories, especially girls in the juvenile justice system. Girls report sexual abuse at particularly disproportionate levels and are more likely than boys to experience such violence within intimate relationships. Girls are also at greater risk of developing negative mental...
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Here’s another thing about millennials – they get in less trouble with the police [Sacramento Bee]
Members of the millennial generation live with their parents more, have less sexual interaction and start families later than prior generations. Turns out they also got in less trouble with the law as teenagers. On average, 5 percent of Californians born between 1982 to 2004 were arrested while younger than the age of 18, according to a new report by the national Center on Juvenile and Criminal Justice, a nonprofit. That compares with 11 percent of those born between 1943 and 1960 and 8...
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Holding Evil Accountable
When I worked in juvenile probation there were times youth were labeled with the diagnosis BAD. They were just bad kids. There are even maximum security juvenile detention centers for kids with the BAD diagnosis. Kids who seem to have been born evil. As a criminal justice academician, I have read details of some of the most hideous crimes ever committed. I have a PhD in criminal justice. Currently I teach criminal justice to undergraduate students eager to begin their careers in...
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How an Intervention Program Stops the Revolving Door of Violent Injuries [KQED California Report]
Pictured: Darius Irvin, a sophomore at San Francisco State University, has survived three separate shootings. The Wraparound Project helped him get out of the line of fire and go back to college. (Laura Klivans/KQED) Darius Irvin grew up in violent neighborhoods in Oakland and San Francisco. While Irvin was never in a gang, he was around them a lot. One winter when he was back home in Oakland from his freshman year of college up in Chico, he knocked on the door of his barbershop. He wanted a...
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In California, Data Shows a Widening Racial Gap As Juvenile Incarceration Has Declined (chronicleofsocialchange.org)
(Image source:gardenapd.org) In the past two decades , the number of youth who are detained or incarcerated by juvenile justice systems has plummeted, a trend largely attributable to declining arrest rates and buffered by intentional system reform. But as the overall numbers have dropped, the racial disparity inside those juvenile facilities has increased, according to new data from the W. Haywood Burns Institute . And in some states, including California, the gap is getting much wider. In...
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It’s self-defeating to bill parents for their children’s jail time (www.sacbee.com)
California law allows counties to charge parents for every night their child is locked up, for renting ankle monitors, for alcohol and drug tests, for public defenders and for other costs. The fees are meant to help counties recoup their costs, without being excessive or unfair. State Sens. Holly Mitchell, D-Los Angeles, and Ricardo Lara, D-Bell Gardens, have put forward Senate Bill 190 , which has a hearing Tuesday before the Senate Public Safety Committee, to end these fees. They say the...
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Juvenile Justice Resources
7 Common Characteristics of Juvenile Mental Health Courts Source: Gains Center, SAMHSA Description: Identifies seven common characteristics of Juvenile Mental Health Courts (JMHCs) as part of a National Institute of Justice – funded study,...
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Kamala Harris Unveils Justice Reform Plan Focused on Youth and Families [chronicleofsocialchange.org]
By Sara Tiano, The Chronicle of Social Change, September 9, 2019 Democratic presidential candidate Kamala Harris rolled out a criminal justice reform plan Monday that focused heavily on youth justice and child welfare issues. Harris’s plans aligns with several fellow Democrats on proposing reforms to the juvenile justice system, but she is the first in the crowded Democratic primary field to talk about addressing some child welfare issues. A key tenet of Harris’s plan is the creation of a...
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Kids Under 12 Can No Longer be Sent to Juvenile Hall for Most Crimes Starting in 2020 [capradio.org]
By Steve Milne, Capital Public Radio, December 20, 2019 One of the last pieces of legislation from former California Gov. Jerry Brown’s final year in office would end the prosecution of pre-teens who commit crimes, other than murder and forcible sexual assault. Right now, California has no minimum age for sending children to juvenile hall. Beginning in the new year, counties will no longer be allowed to process kids under 12 years old through the juvenile justice system. Instead, they will...
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L.A. Supervisors Demand Plan to Help “Crossover Kids,” Young People Failed by Two Juvenile Systems [chronicleofsocialchange.org]
We know that, statistically speaking, kids who spend time in Los Angeles County’s foster care system — or any foster care system, for that matter — have worse outcomes when they reach adulthood than youth who’ve never wound up in the child dependency system at all. Over the past few years, new California state laws that are sensitive to this problem, along with community-based programs and dedicated child advocates, have helped to ameliorate those bad stats to some degree. Yet there is...
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Let’s invest in the care of our young people instead of putting them in cages [Sacramento Bee]
BY CHET HEWITT AND SHANE GOLDSMITH SPECIAL TO THE SACRAMENTO BEE JUNE 13, 2019 02:40 AM, UPDATED JUNE 13, 2019 02:40 AM California’s young people need care, not cages. That call to action has become the drumbeat of a powerful movement of advocates working across California to push us to think bigger – and act boldly – to improve the health and wellbeing of our state’s biggest assets: our young people. A central theme and focus of this movement has been to encourage California to shift its...
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Meet the ‘Monsters:’ Documentary Looks at California Juvenile Debate [JJIE.org]
One’s kicking himself over an unrequited lifelong crush. One dreams of being a Navy SEAL. Another leads you on a mocking tour of his new home. They’d seem like typical teenage boys — if they weren’t awaiting trial for violent crimes. Juan Gamez, Antonio Hernandez and Jarad Nava are the youthful offenders at the heart of “ They Call Us Monsters ,” a new documentary that follows their lives in a Los Angeles juvenile detention center. They’re held in a special wing of the lockup reserved for...
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Nevada County Probation Department implementing Transitional Age Youth Program in Juvenile Hall
By Michael Ertola, Chief Probation Officer California State Assembly Passed Public Safety SB 1004 on June 28, 2016, to allow five California counties to implement a pilot program to house Transitional Age Youth (18-21 years old) in their Juvenile Halls. The five counties include Nevada, Napa, Butte, Santa Clara and Alameda. The Chief Probation Officers of California (CPOC) sponsored bill SB 1004 to provide appropriate housing, programs and services needed by Transitional Age Youth. SB 1004...
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Pathways to Policy [changelabsolutions.org]
Young people are raising their voices to create safer, healthier communities—even if they’re not old enough to vote yet. From #NeverAgain to #MeToo, young people have been at the forefront of advocacy movements for decades, their passion and idealism sparking millions of people to take action. How can we channel that energy in a way that can lead to concrete public policy change? We created Pathways to Policy to answer that question—and to support young people in their pursuit of a better...
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Prosecuting Youth As Adults Creates Racial Disparities and ‘Justice-By-Geography’ [JJIE.org]
Each year, California prosecutors charge hundreds of youth in the adult criminal justice system through a power called “ direct file .” Prosecutors make the decision to direct file behind closed doors without considering a youth’s background, mental health, trauma history, degree of participation in the offense or potential for rehabilitation. Direct file also does not allow for many due process protections — for example, no hearing before a judge and no right to appeal. Prosecutors in...
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Report Offers Insights For Trading Juvenile Incarceration For Community-Based Strategies [witnessla.com]
Over the last 20 years, youth violence dropped precipitously (and unexpectedly) in California. Law enforcement arrested minors 22,601 times for violent crimes in 1994. That arrest rate dropped 68 percent, to 7,291 arrests two decades later, in 2017. In addition, a collective turning away from harshly punitive incarceration for kids, and a movement toward community-based diversion and services, have helped keep kids out of juvenile lockups. (But not all kids—racial disparities in the juvenile...
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Report Outlines New Therapeutic Approach Coming to L.A. County Juvenile Detention Facility (chronicleofsocialchange.org)
A new report outlines a roadmap and summary of the “L.A. Model,” a collection of therapeutic-based practices aimed at improving care for youth in Los Angeles County juvenile detention facilities. Using the L.A. Model, the Kilpatrick campus offers a chance to “bring L.A.’s juvenile justice system into the 21st century.” The new approach calls for a facility based on small group arrangements in a therapeutic environment with an emphasis on creating a culture of care and respect among all staff...
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Should LA County youth prisons close? Here’s what residents think (dailynews.com)
Should LA County youth prisons close? That's how 61 percent of Los Angeles County residents surveyed feel about juvenile halls, according to the results of a statewide poll released Wednesday. Across the state, more than half of the 1,042 California residents in the survey said they supported prevention and rehabilitation programs for youth instead of juvenile halls. The survey was commissioned by the California Endowment and conducted online in June. In January, the Los Angeles County Board...
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Some 350 Florida Leaders Expected to Attend Think Tank with Dr. Vincent Felitti, Co-Principal Investigator of the ACE Study; Expert on ACEs Science
Leaders from across the Sunshine State will take part in a “Think Tank” in Naples, FL, on Monday, August 6, to help create a more trauma-informed Florida. The estimated 350 attendees will include policy makers and community teams made up of school superintendents, law enforcement officers, judges, hospital administrators, mayors, PTA presidents, child welfare experts, mental health and substance abuse treatment providers, philanthropists, university researchers, state agency heads, and...
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Stopping School Pushout for: Girls Involved in the Juvenile Justice System (nwlc.org)
Girls are the fastest growing population in the juvenile justice (JJ) system, with girls of color, LGBT and gender nonconforming youth, and girls with disabilities being overrepresented relative to school enrollment or share of the overall population. For instance, Black girls make up 15 percent of girls enrolled in public schools but 30.8 percent of girls in juvenile justice center schools. Girls who enter the juvenile justice system are likely to have suffered sexual abuse, violence, and...
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Study Examines Racial Disparities in the Juvenile Justice System (socialjusticesolutions.org)
A study completed in November by the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) and the Los Angeles County Department of Public Health suggests the racial make-up of a neighborhood may have a greater influence on the racial disparities in youth arrests than poverty, unemployment, vacant housing or school quality. The study, “Understanding Racial and Ethnic Disparities in Arrest: The Role of Individual, Home, School, and Community Characteristics,” uses data from the National Longitudinal...