Promoting Justice for All Youth Requires Transforming Systems of Injustice
Through systemic policy and reform efforts, The Gault Center seeks to disrupt the harmful impacts of the legal system on children, families, and communities; decriminalize adolescence, particularly where youth of color are treated disparately; and ensure the constitutional protections of counsel for all young people in court.
Transformative Policy in Action
The Gault Center partners with youth defenders and advocates to transform policies and practices that harm the rights, interests and futures of the youth we serve. Through the Transformative Policy Initiative, we facilitate and lead opportunities for youth defenders and policy advocates to share ideas and strategies to advance policies that promote the health and wellbeing of young people, strengthen communities, and educate decisionmakers. While the Gault Center engages across the full spectrum of policy issues affecting young people and youth defenders, we are currently hosting four workgroups identified by the community as most urgent in this moment. To advance this work we convene monthly workgroup meetings and quarterly national meetings to advance these collective efforts to reshape the policies and practices that further entrench young people in the juvenile legal system.
Transfer to Adult Court
This workgroup is focused on supporting youth policy advocates as they work to eliminate the transfer of young people into adult court.
Conditions of Confinement/Detention
This workgroup is focused on supporting youth policy advocates as they work to address harmful conditions of confinement and find pathways out of detention for young people.
Challenging Gun Policies
This workgroup supports policy advocates working to replace punitive, ineffective gun policies harming young people with evidence-based solutions that address root causes of gun possession and violence, reduce racial disparities, strengthen public safety, and help young people thrive.
Age of Jurisdiction
This workgroup is focused on supporting youth policy advocates as they work to raise both the minimum age of prosecution and the upper age limit of juvenile court jurisdiction.
What the Youth Defense Community has to say about The Gault Center’s policy efforts and support:
“The Gault Center is a critical voice in policy change through their uncompromising belief in the promise of youth and the power of the lawyers who represent those youth.”
Brooke Harris, Executive Director California Youth Defender Center
"No entity has provided more advocacy, litigation support, or policy leadership to our Office Puerto Rico Legal Aid Society, Juvenile Justice Program than the Gault Center. From ending the indiscriminate shackling of children to raising the minimum age of prosecution, the Gault Center has been a constant force bending the long arc of youth justice toward dignity and protection. Their partnership doesn’t just respond to the needs of the moment — it helps shape the policies and possibilities that safeguard young people for generations to come.”
Jessica Meléndez Dedós, Directora Regional Mayagüez y Coordinadora Programa Justicia Juvenil Sociedad para Asistencia Legal
The Gault Center’s Policy Advocacy Takes Many Forms
The Gault Center’s policy advocacy takes many forms, including educational campaigns, court rule reform, supporting legislative reform, writing letters, leading policy initiatives, and publishing guidance for the youth justice community. Successful policy actions require youth defenders to seek broad-based support and develop collaborations across political aisles and partnering with other organizations to support change.
Here are some examples of the types of policy work the Gault Center has advanced:
Early Access to Counsel
Youth Defense Standards
- Issue Brief-Juvenile Defense Standards: A Framework for the Specialized Representation of Youth
- Youth Defense System Standards
- Youth Defense Standards
At least 24 States have adopted Youth Defense Standards across the country. Here are examples of states that have adopted Youth Defense Standards:
Youth Defense Specialization
State Assessments
Campaign against indiscriminate shackling of young people
Post Disposition Representation
- A Call to Expand Post-Disposition Representation of Youth in the Juvenile Legal System
- Issue Brief: Advancing Post Disposition Representation to Protect the Due Process Rights of Youth and Promote Positive Youth Outcomes
- Youth Defender Post-Disposition Practice Tool
- Models for Change Innovation Brief: Addressing the Legal Needs of Youth After Disposition
Eliminating Fees and Costs
Examples of The Gault Center’s Impact on Youth Justice Policies
For nearly 30 years, the Gault Center has stood with youth defenders, young people, families and communities to ensure that every young person has a zealous advocate at their side. The Gault Center’s impact in shifting both state and national policy practices is evidenced below:
Ended the Juvenile Death Penalty
“No entity has provided more advocacy, litigation support, and public policy over the last 25 years than the Gault Center. From the abolition of capital punishment for youth to the right to counsel, the Gault Center has fought for children’s rights.”
-Kameron J., Austin, TX
From its inception, the Gault Center imbued adolescent development research in its work. The science of adolescent development and the work of the youth defense community led to the elimination of the death penalty for children under 18.
Establishing Youth Defense Specialization
“The Gault Center's assessment was the catalyst to create a statewide office dedicated solely to improving access to and quality of counsel in delinquency proceedings."
-Eric Z. from North Carolina
The Gault Center’s training, state assessments, and advocacy have helped establish youth defense as a specialized practice that demands specialized training, knowledge, resources, and support to ensure young people’s constitutional rights.
Ending Indiscriminate Shackling
"The Gault Center inspired and supported me in a successful push for legislation to stop indiscriminate shackling of children in the courtroom in Virginia.”
-L.R.P., Public Defender, Virginia
When the Gault Center launched a national campaign in 2014 to end the indiscriminate shackling of children in juvenile court, only 13 states prohibited the practice. Today, 40 states, DC, and Puerto Rico limit shackling in juvenile court, while just 10 states do not.
Teaming Up to Defend Children
The Gault Center is so grateful for the work of the Players Coalition, an organization that “exists to end social injustices and racial inequality so future generations have the opportunity to thrive without barriers.” Players Coalition has been supporting youth justice advocacy since 2018.
Watch Anquan Bolden’s Statement our Youth Defender Leadership Summit in Florida on Players Coalition Teaming Up with the Gault Center to give youth defenders around the country the tools and support to fight for our children.
Watch the Statement of Jamaal Bailey regarding New York’s Right2RemainSilent Act
Brandon Miller spoke about youth rights and opportunities at the Youth Defender Leadership Summit in Charlotte, NC.
Executive Director Mary Ann Scali spoke about youth defense with Players Coalition members at an event leading up to Super Bowl LIII at the Georgia World Congress Center in Atlanta.
See below some of the amazing work that Players Coalition has done in the youth justice space:
If you have a local or national policy issue that you think Players Coalition would be interested in becoming involved in, please contact us.
Do you have policy resources to share (testimony, sample letters of support, community education tools, op-eds, etc.)? Contact us here.
Do you have policy wins to share with us? Please share your commitments & celebrations with us here.
Please reach out to inquiries@defendyouthrights.org if you are a youth defender, part of a youth defense team or youth policy advocate interested in joining one of these workgroups!
Policy Partnerships
