Youth & Families
Examines the impact of race on age at the onset of school disciplinary actions and police contact, and the rate of receiving increasingly severe disciplinary actions.
This report details the results of the first-ever state-wide Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs) survey administered to people currently incarcerated for crimes they committed as children (under eighteen). The trauma measured from ACEs surveys include physical, sexual, and emotional abuse; physical and emotional neglect; separation from parents; mental illness or substance abuse in the home; parent…
An evaluation report for the LEAP initiative Prepared for the Annie E. Casey Foundation June 2024.
A robust literature is developing around how the stress of discrimination is implicated in individual- and group-level sleep disturbances, and how these disturbances contribute to the development of population-level sleep disparities over time. Although discrimination can be based on many individual and intersecting biases, like gender, sexuality, socioeconomic status, and education, in this article, we…
In this session of our 2022 Racial Justice Training Series and Book Club, Prof. Kristin Henning and Mary Ann Scali, Executive Director of the Gault Center, were joined by Jeannette Bocanegra, Executive Director of Justice for Families (J4F), and Prof. Dorothy Roberts, George A. Weiss University Professor of Law & Sociology and Raymond Pace &…
The work described herein articulates a way forward for the NIH to continue to improve youth mental health and to reduce YMHD through supporting rigorous, impactful research. However, the urgency of the youth mental health crisis and YMHD is so pressing that many NIH ICOs have already begun this important work, particularly through supporting research.…
This article calls for the categorical exclusion of young children from juvenile court jurisdiction as a pathway toward the abolition of the juvenile legal system in its current form. This article highlights the landscape of age-based jurisdictional boundaries across the country: 24 states have no minimum age of arrest and prosecution, while 18 states have…
This report is the product of a one-year project to hear directly from Black communities about what safety means to them. The Black Public Defender Association, in partnership with the BlackRoots Alliance, Cook County Public Defender, and Northwestern University, conducted more than 100 interviews of Black residents in Chicago to collect their stories and advice…
Sydney Baker et al., 29 Psychol. Pub. Pol’y & L. 320 (2023). This article is a call to action for the research community and advocates to engage youth and families with lived experience in the legal system in research on the impacts of race, development, and identity on youth interrogations. The authors detail the limitations…
This guide provides information about what obstacles may lie ahead and how to prepare yourself as you move forward with your life after being involved in the juvenile court system. Your juvenile record can affect your life for years to come. But you can still pursue your goals and build a bright future by understanding…
The perspectives of young people with system experience are particularly important in efforts to strengthen and improve juvenile defense advocacy. With the state, prosecutors, victims, witnesses, law enforcement, and probation officers on the other side of the table, youth rely on their defender to hear and honor their voices and ensure they are full participants…
This guide provides information about what obstacles may lie ahead and how to prepare yourself as you move forward with your life after being involved in the juvenile court system. Your juvenile record can affect your life for years to come. But you can still pursue your goals and build a bright future by understanding…