Youth Today

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Black Girls Pay the Price When Police Enter Schools

Sen. Marco Rubio sent a letter to Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos and Attorney General Jeff Sessions this week wrongly blaming the...

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Young Sex Offenders Shouldn’t Have to Register; It’s Ineffective and Hurts Everyone Around Them

Sex offender registration policies were initially developed for adults with sexual offenses, but have recently been extended to include youth with sexual...

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#MeToo, Women’s Marches, Democrats in 2018: 2 Youth Mentors Talking

Recently, the two sat down for a conversation as two mentors in the field to assess some of the major developments in...

Foster Parents: Black couple sit close smiling inot camera

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How We Found More Black Foster Parents and Confronted the Racial Disparity in Foster Care

I’ve worked in child welfare for over eight years and, from day one, I’ve been struck by the high numbers of black...

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Revival of Indigenous Justice in Canada, U.S., Should Be Compass for Restorative Justice

Most people would agree that the criminal justice system needs to change in some way. The restorative justice (RJ) movement offers an...

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School Eating Contest Leaves Bad Taste in Teachers’ Mouths

At the end of a long week of classes, a 10th-grade girl from student government made an announcement in assembly over the...

Trauma-informed care heart-shaped word cloud on pink wit green border

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We Need to Understand How to Provide Trauma-informed Care

The philosophy of trauma-informed care is becoming more and more embedded in the philosophies and practices of child-serving agencies.

OPINION_Family of 4 Silhoette one child on shoulders adult-one child walking

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A Plan for Real Reform of Child Welfare Finance – From an Unlikely Source

The so-called Family First Prevention Services Act has been hailed as a radical change in how child welfare is paid for by...

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Youth Who Help Reformers Must Be Treated As Partners, Not Tokens

Policymakers, practitioners and advocates seeking to improve the juvenile justice system have increasingly acted on calls from youth and their families to...

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Florida Shootings Another Sign We Don’t Value Children Nor Their Lives

Before the slaughter at the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Florida, The New York Times produced a powerful graphic showing the...

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How to Improve Mission-Related Outcomes (With Performance Dashboard)

By now you’ve surely heard time and again that, as a nonprofit, it’s critical that you measure your organization’s “impact” so that...

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Use People First Language to Discourage Deficit Thinking About Our Youth

When I was in graduate school at Brooklyn College back in the late 1990s, I took a class in special education where...

Paper cutout of child's headwith severalcracks in skull on wood background

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Do Spikes in Foster Care Contribute to More Child Abuse Deaths?

More than 30 years ago, when I was a reporter for a daily newspaper, I was assigned a story about what looked...

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Carefully Designed Internships Create Benefits for Everyone

While we often hear about the challenges in every area of juvenile justice, how often do we hear about the rewards? Perhaps...

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We Must Stop the Rampant Criminalization of Youth with Disabilities

Minority youth are more likely to become incarcerated than white youth. This fact is so prevalent that even people outside the juvenile...

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#MeToo Needs to Include #GirlsToo

I recently read an Associated Press interview with singer and actress Mary J. Blige in which she shared her personal account of...

Challenging, angry teen boy stands looking yp at camera with arms crossed.

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How to Teach the Most Challenging Youth to Problem Solve & Reduce Staff Injuries

Restrictive therapeutic facilities — inpatient psychiatry units, residential facilities, group homes and juvenile detention facilities — serve the most challenging youth in...

Silouettes in multiple colors people sitting around table.

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Is Serving on a Board Right for You?

Let's start by saying that it’s clear that all professionals who work with youth have full schedules, are always busy with weekend...

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How People Affected by Justice System Handled Living Near Drug Activity, Sex Workers

Several years ago I was running a reentry project in south Brooklyn supporting formerly incarcerated people returning to their communities. We were...