MJDA

In 1957, Dwight Eisenhower was in the White House, Elvis topped the charts with “All Shook Up,” and Missouri lawmakers wrote the state’s juvenile code.

The system’s basic structure hasn’t changed in 60 years. And in 2015, the U.S. Department of Justice raised questions about how well that structure protects the rights of the kids who come into the system.

Oct 4

Oct 4 New law lets young adult offenders serve time in juvenile detention

Three-year pilot program will give 18- to 21-year-olds chance to access educational, support services.

Oct 4

Oct 4 How America Is Battling Its Horrific Opioid Epidemic

Ideas and Opinions

THAT WE’RE IN the middle of a horrific opioid epidemic is no longer news. In bathrooms, bedrooms, and alleyways across the country, people are overdosing and dying every day. So we need to start talking about solutions. As Congress finally earmarks funding for public health initiatives, doctors, prosecutors, police, and local lawmakers are fighting to slow the death toll in their communities—with wildly different strategies.

Sep 30

Sep 30 The Lessons of California for Juvenile Justice Reform

Ideas and Opinions

Those who equate juvenile justice reform with better institutions should consider the California lesson. For the past 13 years, the state’s youth correctional system operated under court monitoring due to its failure to provide rehabilitative services or a safe environment.

Sep 27

Sep 27 The most significant criminal justice reform of Obama's tenure could reach his desk very soon

Even though the year began with strong bipartisan support for federal sentencing reform, no major changes to the criminal justice system have made it out of Congress thanks to a combination of legislative gridlock, election-year rhetoric about rising crime in some cities, and Republican reluctance to hand President Obama a major victory.

But on Thursday, the House of Representatives quietly — and overwhelmingly — passed what might be the most significant justice reform measure to reach Obama in his tenure.

Promoting Racial Equity in Trauma-Informed Care/Services to Reduce Racial and Ethnic Disproportionality and Disparities in Child Welfare

Sep 27

Sep 27 Promoting Racial Equity in Trauma-Informed Care/Services to Reduce Racial and Ethnic Disproportionality and Disparities in Child Welfare

Viewing Recommendations, Reading Recommendations

Khatis Waheed presents on Courageous Conversations: Leading with Race and using an Equity Lens.

Sep 27

Sep 27 'Refuse to lose': Teen inspired inside juvenile detention helping others

Kevin Barnwell

Facility News

MUSKEGON, MI -- Change how you think. Change how you feel.

That's some of the advice Tyya Cunningham received from mentor Leslie King, founder and director of Sacred Beginnings.

Cunningham, 16, of Muskegon, is going through the Lighthouse Girls Treatment Program, which is part of the 20th Circuit Court Family Division.

Sacred Beginnings is a Grand Rapids-based nonprofit that works with human trafficking victims.

Sep 27

Sep 27 Thirteen States Have No Minimum Age for Adult Prosecution of Children

Thirteen states have not imposed a minimum age for prosecuting a child as an adult, leaving eight-, nine-, and ten-year-old children vulnerable to extreme punishment, trauma, and abuse within adult jails and prisons.

Sep 20

Sep 20 Degree of difficulty: Is college still worth the cost? Usually

Education

It’s a distortion that’s oft-repeated, and refuses to die: Legions of college grads working long hours as baristas, their expensive degrees wasted after not finding a job in their chosen fields.

Sep 20

Sep 20 School choice producing segregation in districts across the state

Education

Holland, Mich. – For more than a decade, Holland Public Schools has watched its enrollment fall, prompting the closure – and demolition – of multiple schools.

The decline is not the result of an aging community with fewer, school-age children. Rather, it’s largely a reflection of Michigan’s generous school choice policies. Choice has, consciously or not, left districts like Holland not only scrambling for students, but more racially segregated as its white students leave, often for districts that are less diverse.

Sep 16

Sep 16 House Education Committee Backs Bill to Overhaul Federal Juvenile-Justice Law

The House education committee unanimously backed a bill to change policies and practices governing juvenile-justice and at-risk youth and reported it favorably to the full House of Representatives for consideration.

Sep 13

Sep 13 Lawsuit: Juvenile detention staffer watched as Ky. girl took "last gasps"

NEW YORK — As Gynnya McMillen coughed and gasped for air, shaking in a seizure while taking her final breaths, a Kentucky juvenile detention youth worker stood outside her isolation cell watching, according to a federal lawsuit filed by the 16-year-old’s estate.

Sep 13

Sep 13 Court Costs Entrap Nonwhite, Poor Juvenile Offenders

Ideas and Opinions, Juvenile Justice News

JACKSONVILLE, Fla. — When Dequan Jackson had his only brush with the law, at 13, he tried to do everything right.

Charged with battery for banging into a teacher while horsing around in a hallway, he pleaded guilty with the promise that after one year of successful probation, the conviction would be reduced to a misdemeanor.

Sep 6

Sep 6 Juvenile justice age questioned in North Carolina

Area officials mixed on juvenile justice changes

Sep 6

Sep 6 Researchers Say Metaphors Can Help Public Better Understand Juvenile Justice

Juvenile justice reform advocates can spread their message further if they carefully guide their audience to an understanding of adolescent development and the justice system, researchers say.

Sep 1

Sep 1 Students Pledge To Do the “Write” Thing To End Violence

“I don’t remember everything that happened when I was 3, but I can recall one certain night.My mother was sprawled out in the middle of the floor and coated with blood, and my father had dozens of beer bottles. He was breaking the beer bottles and using the sharp parts of the broken glass to cut into her. He had a belt and was whacking her with it over and over. I will never forget that night. Every time I wake up, I see that memory in my head. It’s a never-ending nightmare.”

Sep 1

Sep 1 Michigan prosecutors defying U.S. Supreme Court on ‘juvenile lifers’

Prosecutors across Michigan are fighting to uphold sentences for most of the 350-plus prison inmates now serving mandatory life terms for crimes they committed as juveniles. Their stance is in apparent defiance of a U.S. Supreme Court directive this year that courts across the nation are supposed to reduce life sentences for young offenders except in only “rare” cases.

Sep 1

Sep 1 Unjust: How the Broken Juvenile and Criminal Justice Systems Fail LGBTQ Youth

There are an estimated 57,000 youth in juvenile detention and correctional facilities on any given day, with hundreds of thousands more on probation. The Williams Institute estimates that half of LGBTQ youth in the United States are “at risk” of being arrested or entering juvenile and criminal justice systems.

Sep 1

Sep 1 In prison for decades, one juvenile lifer’s quest for redemption