This article describes the successes of several programs in counties in Indiana. Initiatives include a formal risk assessment for each juvenile offender in Fort Wayne, a shared database of comprehensive case information in Kokomo, and a day treatment program in Bartholomew County.

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Helping Girls Bloom

The Blossom Program for Girls is housed in the First African Methodist Zion Church in Brooklyn. It was created by Isis Sapp-Grant, A former teen gang member who, with the help of two dedicated teachers and a supportive policeman, graduated from high school, went on to college, and earned a master’s degree in social work. She founded the Blossom Program five year ago. The program reaches out to girls between 13 and 21, accepting all comers except those with a pattern of felonious activity or serious mental illnesses.

Sapp says that disadvantaged girls are drawn to gangs, prostitution, and even lock-up facilities, because they think these situations will offer them refuge from their environment. She offers on-site programs on sex and sexuality, social skills and self respect, non-violent conflict resolution, anger management, goal setting and planning.

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2005 Graffiti Hurts National Award
Enter your program to win a Graffiti HurtsNational Award. Winners will receive a cash award of up to $1,000 and national recognition. The contest is open to all anti-graffiti projects that have taken place within the last 12 months. Click on the link above for details and to download applications and rules.

Graffiti Hurts is a community-based graffiti prevention program. It provides resources to help community leaders assess the graffiti problem initiate graffiti prevention activities, and educate youth and adults about the impact of graffiti vandalism on neighborhoods.

Boy Scout Program Behind Bars

Scoutreach, a Boy Scout program for boys whose mothers are at the Washington Corrections Center for Women is run by the Chief Seattle Boy Scout Council. It is the first such program for boys in the country. The program participants meet at the prison once a month. The program is intended to help over come the isolation and loss children of incarcerated parents feel.

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Writing Right: Handwriting Formation Therapy for Juvenile Offenders

A handwriting analyst and formation therapist is working with juvenile probation agencies in several Texas counties to implement at pilot program aimed at reducing recidivism. Juveniles in the program will receive six months of Handwriting Formation Therapy, which serves to change people�s behavior patterns by training them to write in a different way. At the end of the article there is a link to the therapist's web site with more information for interested readers.

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Project CRAFT

Project CRAFT (Community, Restitution, and Apprenticeship-Focused Training) is a program of the Home Buildren Institute. Project CRAFT was designed to improve educational levels, tech vocational skills and reduce recidivism among adjudicated youth while addressing the home building industry’s need for entry level workers. The link above will take you to Project CRAFT fact sheets.

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Adolescent Portable Therapy: A Practical Guide for Service Providers

The Vera Institute’s APT program combines family therapy and individual treatment to reduce adolescent drug use and address mental health problems and behavioral issues. APT’s treatment manual gives service providers and program planners a theoretical framework and procedures, techniques and case examples that will enable them to implement the APT model easily and effectively. Downloadable from the Vera Institute of Justice as a pdf file – 99 pages long.

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Community boards focus on accountability and restitution

An article in the Boston Globe describes programs attempting to use community pressure to control crime in their neighborhoods. These programs are called community accountability boards when adults are involved, juvenile conference committees when kids are involved, as well as other designations. All of them give the authority to the community to hold offenders accountable and give the victims a voice. Vermont has created 62 boards in 43 towns. The boards have handled 1,421 cases in the past decade.

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OJJDP News @ a Glance

The November/December 2004 issue of OJJDP’s online newsletter highlights several OJJDP-supported athletic and recreational programs that strive to prevent delinquency and foster prosocial values.

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Washington State’s Family Integrated Transitions program for Juvenile Offenders: Outcome Evaluation and Benefit-Cost Analysis.

WSIPP evaluated the Washington State FIT program and found:

• FIT reduces recidivism rates – In the FIT program recidivism dropped to 27%. Without FIT 40.6% of offenders were re-convicted for a new felony within 1`8 months of release.
• FIT generates more benefits than costs - FIT is an intensive treatment program that begins in the juvenile institution and continues for four to six months in the community. WSIPP found that FIT achieves $3.15 in benefits per each dollar of program cost.

FIT is based on components from four programs: Multi-Systemic Therapy, Motivational Enhancement Therapy, Relapse Prevention, and Dialectical Behavior Therapy.

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Tucson City Buses Help Kids Find Help

The city bus authority in Tucson, Ariz., has partnered with Project safe Place’s Open Inn initiative, which helps young people in an effort to prevent homelessness, drug abuse, and other programs. Drivers of the city’s 189 buses will provide young people in distress with a free ride while they radio their dispatcher to contact Open Inn, which provides social services to youths and families in crisis. Once contacted, an Open Inn outreach worker will meet the youth at a bus stop along the driver’s route.

Nurse-Family Partnership Success

The Nurse-Family Partnership is a highly refined approach to home visiting, a long established service strategy of nursing. It has been found to be consistently effective in a series of scientifically controlled studies over a 20 year period by Dr. David Olds and his colleagues. The program provides intensive visitation by nurses during a woman’s pregnancy and the first two years after birth. Nurse-Family Partnership program studies found that women in the program:

• Had fewer subsequent pregnancies and births,
• Longer intervals between births of first and second children,
• Longer relationships with partners,
• Fewer months of using welfare and food stamps.

In Olds most recent research results, children whose mothers were in the program demonstrated higher intellectual functioning and vocabulary scores and had fewer behavior problems, among other positive results.

In its recent publication, Benefits and Costs of prevention and Early Intervention Programs for Youth*, the Washington State Institute for Public Policy (WSIPP) identified the Nurse Family Partnership as an outstanding Child Welfare/Home Visitation Program. A cost/benefit analysis of the program found that, minus costs, it provided a benefit to tax payers of over $17,000 per person. The program presently serves 50,000 women in 260 counties in 22 states. (Source: NPR interview with Dr. Olds on Morning Edition, December 8, 2004)

*See chart on page 6 of the report.

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What You Need to Know About Starting a Student Drug-Testing Program

ONDCP (Office of National Drug Control Policy) presents this manual for student drug testing as part of a comprehensive drug and alcohol prevention, intervention, and treatment program. It encourages early intervention to identify nondependent users, through drug resting and other means, then steer them from drugs and into counseling before they come addicted or entice others to use drugs. 35 page pdf file.

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Youth Accountability Boards

aka Juvenile Conference Committees, Community Justice Committees, and a variety of other names, Youth Accountability Boards are a proven diversion program for low-level first time juvenile offenders. This report from the Center for Court Innovation in New York City describes how these programs help prosecutors better address low level juvenile crime and restore the public’s faith in the justice system. YABs are my personal best diversion program because they actively engage members of the community with the juvenile and his or her family, eliminate misperceptions about kids who get in trouble, and create a base of support for juvenile justice in the community. 18 page pdf file.

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Reducing Gun Violence: The St. Louis Consent-to-Search Program

This report evaluates an innovative police program that used community-based sources to identify homes where juveniles might be harboring guns. Police then sought parental permission to search for and confiscate illegal guns. It was a success in its first year, but experienced serious implementation problems thereafter. This report describes both the program’s successes and its problems. 28 page pdf file.

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McGruff Strategies Center

Online forum and resource center is a platform for communities to tell their crime prevention story. It houses the Strategies Database, an online collection of program ideas and innovative practices developed to help community members prevent crime.

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OJJDP Model Programs Guide

The Guide profiles more than 175 prevention and intervention programs and helps communities identify those that best suit their needs. The Guide can be searched by program category, target population, risk and protective factors, effectiveness rating, and other parameters.

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Graffiti Hurts

This web site includes facts about graffiti, information about graffiti prevention and a resource kit for the Graffiti Hurts Awareness Program. The kit includes a program manual, teacher guide, eradication and restoration manual, an educational video, and marketing materials. At the site you will find 10 things You Can Do to Prevent Graffiti and a Fast Facts About Graffiti page which includes this information:

• There are four types of graffiti – hip-hop, gang, hate, and generic (non-threatening messages like “Bobby loves Suzy” or “Class of 1997”).
• Properties located in neighborhoods where there is graffiti vandalism lose 15% of their value.
• There are four primary motivating factors for graffiti vandalism: fame, rebellion, self-expression, and power.
• Immediate removal – within 24-48 hours – is the key to successful graffiti prevention.
• Graffiti cleanup takes a big chunk out of municipal budgets. In 2002 Los Angeles spent $55 million on graffiti removal.

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Employment and Training for Court-Involved Youth

Intended to help policymakers and practitioners meet the challenge of developing programs that successfully prepare court-involved youth for future employment and successfully meet the requirements of employers and industry. Downloadable pdf file. About 80 pages in length including the appendices.

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Martial Arts Program for Sick Kids is Set to Move into Inner-City Schools

A martial arts training program to empower sick children to fight their fears, soothe their pain and provide purpose to their lives, inspires confidence in children physically and emotionally beaten by their diseases. Kids Kicking Cancer is a Detroit-based charity that helps kids cope via karate. It was founded by a rabbi whose own daughter was lost to the disease. Rabbi Goldberg plans to tape kids in hospitals demonstrating karate and show them in inner-city schools to teach at-risk kids the same techniques. Those children will be videotaped and the tapes and viewed by the kids in the hospital, showing them the impact they can have on another child’s life.

Information here is from an article in USA Weekend, a magazine accompanying the Sunday paper in some areas, for Oct 1-3, 2004 if you’d like more details. Link above is to the web site.

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Moving Youth from Risk to Opportunity

From the KIDS Count 2004 Data Book, a section on programs and models assisting youth in foster care, in the juvenile justice system, about teen parents and preventing teen pregnancy, academically at-risk youth, and publications. Links to all.

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PEPNet 2003 Profiles

This downloadable pdf from the National Youth Employment Coalition contains profiles of Promising and Effective Practices in Youth Initiatives, the criteria for effective practices. The ACS In-School Youth Power Program for instance, has certified teachers serve as trained advocates and mentors to help teams of at-risk students improve academic skills and prepare for a career decision.  The complete file is 72 pages. Can be examined and/or downloaded by section.

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Justice for Children: Detention as a Last Resort – Innovative Initiatives in the East Asia and Pacific Region

This UNICEF publication contains four main chapters and you may want to consider simply downloading the chapters of most interest to you because the complete document is 104 pages. Chapters address legal assistance of children, diversion and restorative justice, and rehabilitation and reintegration.

The YouthArts Toolkit

Downloadable detailed information about how to plan, run, provide training, and evaluate arts programs for at-risk youth. The toolkit is based on the results of a project begun in 1995 to define critical elements and best practices of arts programs designed for the at-risk youth population at three pilot sites.  Practical, applicable, information in four chapters:

• Program Planning
• Team Training
• Evaluation
• Costs, Resources, and Advocacy

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RiverReach Youth Initiative

This article from Connect for Kids describes a summer rafting program for kids on the South Platte River in Denver, Colorado. The kids see wildlife like birds, beavers, and muskrats from a raft in the middle of the city. At least 50% of the kids who raft with RiverReach have earned it through community service. Organizations pay RiverReach to guide raft trips and that money goes to support free trips for youth who have volunteered in their community.

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Helping Youths Stay Out Of Jail

A DePaul University study has found that a program designed to take young offenders out of Cook County Juvenile Court and into mediation is helping its participants avoid getting rearrested. In the first year, 61% of those who had completed mediation had not been arrested. After three years, 69% who completed mediation had not been rearrested. The study found that mediation works best for offenders 16 and 17 years old.

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Martial Arts Programs for Adolescents

• Karate Kids: Children and Martial Arts
• FCCJ karate program helps at-risk youth
• The Application of Traditional Martial Arts Practice and Theory to the Treatment of Violent Adolescents
• An Effective Approach to Violence Prevention: Traditional Martial Arts in Middle School
• Karate Cops: Making a Difference in the Neighborhood

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Supporting High-Risk Youth with Paid Mentors and Counselors

This new brief from Public/Private Ventures proposes the creation of a paid mentor-counselor for high-risk youth. The mentor would be committed to staying with this group of young people over considerable periods of time, up to 12 years. The longevity of this connection appears to be a key to the early evidence of success that programs of this kind are experiencing. Paid mentor-counselors represent a middle ground between volunteers and professionals. The position requires special personal qualities: a sincere interest in working with young people, flexibility, patience, understanding, and resiliency, and a positive role model. Many are former teachers. Approximately 20 page pdf file.

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Juvenile Justice Education: Improving Chances.

The Corrections.com web site contains interesting articles on education in detention and other information of interest to the field. The link above will take you to the portion of the web site devoted to juveniles. Below you’ll find two articles and a dance program I found of interest:

• Juvenile Justice Education: Improving Chances

• New Program Helps Offenders Learn by Listening

• Dance Program Gets Juveniles Moving on the Right Track

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Benefits and Costs of Prevention and Early Intervention Programs for Youth

The Washington State Institute for Public Policy has just published a new cost/benefit analysis of the state’s programs for youth. The report finds that some prevention and early intervention programs for youth give taxpayers a good return on the dollar. The report recommendations to the state include the following:

• Invest in research-proven “blue chip” prevention and early intervention programs.
• Avoid spending money on programs where there is little evidence of program effectiveness.
• Keep abreast of the latest research-based findings from around the United States to determine where there are opportunities to use taxpayer dollars wisely. The ability to distinguish a successful from an unsuccessful program requires specialized knowledge.
• Consider a strategy to encourage local government investment in research-proven programs.

Pages 6 and 7 of the report will give you a Summary of Benefits and Costs in 2003 dollars. I think you’ll find the results on these two pages interesting. For example, effective programs for juvenile offenders have the highest net benefit. Such programs yield from $1,900 to $31,200 per youth.

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YouthBuild USA.

YouthBuild USA is a national nonprofit organization that supports a nationwide network of 200 YouthBuild programs. In YouthBuild programs, unemployed and undereducated young people ages 16-24 work toward their GED or high school diploma while learning construction skills by building affordable housing for homeless and low-income people.

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A Place to Grow: Evaluation of the New York City Beacon Schools

Beacons are community centers located in public school buildings and offering a range of activities and services to participants of all ages, before and after school, in the evenings, and on weekends. Findings in this evaluation indicate that the majority of young people were taking advantage of the activities offered at the Beacon and believed they were developing new competencies because of their participation at the center. The link above is to the summary report, a 14 page pdf  file.

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Drug Court in School

Once or twice a month, Judge Mary Ann Gunn of the Washington county circuit court in Fayetteville, Arkansas, holds drug courts sessions in school gymnasiums. The sessions take place in front of several hundred students at a time. Judge Gunn’s goal is to show children where drug use can lead. The first thing children see is people in leg chains and handcuffs and yellow suits coming to the court and talking about their drug use.

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The National Association For Shoplifting Prevention (NASP)

NASP is a nonprofit [501(c)(3)] organization whose mission is to raise public awareness about the harmful effects of shoplifting on youth, families and communities, unite public opinion toward constructive solutions, deliver needed programs and services and engage community action in prevention efforts to improve the lives of those affected and reduce the number of people who become involved.

NASP conducts research and offers rehabilitation programs for juveniles caught shoplifting.  There is a special section only for criminal justice.  At this website you can look at shoplifting facts, recidivism studies, and other information about the nature and characteristics of shoplifters.

ChildTrends’ Guide to Effective Programs for Children and Youth – an easy reference guide to programs that work. Can be searched by outcome, age and developmental stage or by category.

The Seattle Post-Intelligencer reports on a program in which women prisoners in the Washington Corrections Center for Women help students towards college degrees. The nine women in the program have now read nearly 200 college texts about such subjects as philosophy, auto mechanics, Windows XP, math and art. They work with 12 community colleges, producing audiotapes for students who are blind or have reading disabilities. 

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Philadelphia ’s Youth Aid Panels

Youth Aid Panels, probably best known around the country as juvenile conference committees, are a community diversion program that has been in operation in communities across the country for at least 30 years. They provide an alternative to court for first-time offenders. The juvenile offenders and their parents appear before members of their neighborhood or community Youth Aid Panel. The panel members are adult volunteers who get to the bottom of events and design an appropriate punishment for the child. There are 28 Youth Aid Panels in Philadelphia .

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• Juvenile Auto Theft Prevention Program – This program is staffed by volunteers who educate juveniles about the harmful and often deadly consequences of auto theft.

   

• Juvenile Auto Theft Prevention Offenders Outreach Program – 12 week class for first offenders.

   

• Street Law in Juvenile Justice Programs –In this section see the sample lesson

   

• Street Law Juvenile Justice Re-Entry Program – With details on how to apply to be a new site for this program.

   

• Street Law Publications

   

Federal Placement Assistance Funding for Delinquency Services (AKA Title IV-E Foster Care Program) – This issue of the Ohio Children, Families, and the Courts Bulletin published by NCJJ for the State of Ohio walks courts through the IV-E changes and discusses the experiences of local courts that have successfully made those changes. Patrick Griffith, who can make this kind of information not only clear, but interesting (!), wrote this bulletin. Nine pages.

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To see a cost/benefit analysis of Scared Straight and other juvenile programs, go to the WSIPP(Washington State Institute for Public Policy) report The Comparative Costs and Benefits of Programs to Reduce Crime (Version 4) and look at pages 10-11-12 of the report.

• Justice Based After-School Programs – This Fact Sheet describes a pilot program to develop a preventive approach to juvenile crime and victimization. Includes descriptions of model programs. 2 pages.

   

• COPS Innovations – This section of the site examines important issues in community policing in depth. Promising Strategies from the Field: A National Overview, for instance, looks at innovative uses of COPS funding in a number of communities around the country that include several youth programs. 

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Kentucky’s Juvenile Intensive Supervision Teams (JIST)

JIST has grown from five communities in 1998 to 17 programs in 12 counties and cities. The JIST team also involves parents in the child’s probation and sends a message throughout the child’s circle that the police and DJJ are serious about enforcement. (Juvenile Justice Digest, June 17, 2003 )

This is the final report of the Washington State Institute for Public Policy evaluation of the state’s juvenile court Early Intervention Program (EIP). The goal of the program was to prevent high risk first time juvenile offenders from becoming further entrenched in the court system. WSIPP examined the program and found that EIP produced no significant difference in recidivism rates. The state discontinued funding for EIP after the program had been in operation for two years. 4 page pdf file.

Scroll to the bottom of this page for more pet assisted therapy sites.

Girl Scouts Behind Bars

At the end of this article you will find a telephone number for more information about the Girl Scouts Behind Bars program.

The Adolescent Artists Track is a new feature of the Institute. It convenes Creative Communities students from across the country for a weekend of leadership training and personal development workshops. 

Visit the Creative Communities Web Site - While you're there click on "Creative Communities" and look in on the web site of 20 Creative Communities organizations around the country. 

Want more? Visit the web site of the National Guild of Community Schools of the Arts. 

Middle-school aged girls will spend three weeks this summer banging nails, sawing boards, cutting metal with welding torches and getting greasy under the hood of a car. Rosie’s Girls is a three week trades exploration program for girls entering 6^th through 8^th grades. It is designed to build self-esteem, physical confidence, and leadership skills. Rosie’s Girls is named after Rosie the Riveter, a fictional character created during World War II to recruit women to work in defense plants.

• The HOPE Act: Services for Street Youth – This program was developed to bring services to street youth who have no family support or for whom foster placements have not been successful. The program experienced some success, and some difficulties too.

   

• Evaluating How Juvenile Rehabilitation Administration’s Intensive Parole Program Affects Recidivism – State funded intensive parole for the highest-risk youth did not result in reductions in recidivism. Recidivism rates for the program were the same as those for a control group of comparable youth. 

   

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• Washington State’s Implementation of Aggression Replacement Training for Juvenile Offenders: Preliminary Findings (two pages)

   

• Washington State’s Implementation of Functional Family Therapy for Juvenile Offenders: Preliminary Findings (two pages)

   

• The Juvenile Justice System in Washington State: Recommendations to Improve Cost-Effectiveness (8 pages) In brief, here are the recommendations of WSIPP to the Washington State Legislature on Juvenile Justice Costs:

   

  :§         Shift a portion of state funds currently spent on community supervision caseloads to research-based interventions. The research evidence is clear that certain proven and well-implemented treatment services produce much high returns on taxpayer dollars.

   

  §         Require state-funded treatment programs for juvenile offenders to demonstrate a quality-control process. The research is also clear that effective quality control is vital to making treatment services work.

   

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  Community YouthMapping

   

  Young people, called mappers, canvass their neighborhoods using a survey tool to gather baseline information on the resources available for young people, children and families – places to go, opportunities, and things to do.

   

  CYM is more than a “project,” it is a catalyst to mobilizing youth and adults in the community. It has been implemented in over 30 sites across the country with positive community outcomes. The Center for Youth Development and Policy Research says that some very fundamental things can happen in the YouthMapping process:

   

  • Use of data – the collection of new data can provide a comprehensive look at what community resources really exist for children, youth and families from a youth perspective. It can be used in a variety of settings  – by schools, for grants, for employment and economic development, availability and accessibility of resources.

     

  • Easy Access to Data – CYM provides a variety of user friendly ways for the broader community to gain access to data on resources.

     

  • Youth/Adult Involvement – Engaging the community in shifting attitudes about young people. Young people are the key stakeholders in the planning, collection, data entry, analysis and dissemination of the information. Adults provide technical, political and personal support to youth as they collect, analyze and present the data.

     

  Read more about CYM at these web sites:

   

  • Ten Steps in Community YouthMapping

     

  • Center for Youth Development and Policy research Youth Development Mobilization Strategies

     

  • Community Mapping

     

  • Pinellas County , Florida YouthMapping

     

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    Geese Theatre Company

     

    The Geese Theatre Company is a theatrical company committed to pursuing a multi-agency approach to working with offenders and other groups. Geese Theatre productions uses three key devices in its performances:

     

    • The Mask: a “front” for how we portray daily life.

       

    • Expanding the Role Repertoire: allows participants to take on new roles within which to practice new skills.

       

    • The Challenge: establishes the participant’s personal identification with and empathy toward other points of view.

       

    Performances are improvisational frameworks with built-in strategies that make interaction with audiences possible and enable them to shape the outcome of scenes and the plays’ conclusions.

     

    Geese Theatre was established in the United States in 1980 and in the United Kingdom in 1987. The links here are to Geese Theatre in the U.K. Two publications from Geese Theatre U.K. may be of particular interest to readers:

     

    Lifting the Weight CD ROM – an interactive game aimed at male offenders in prison, young offender institutions, or on probation. The CD gives players the challenge of making difficult decisions at “choice points” within several real-life scenarios. More details at the link.

     

    The Geese Theatre Handbook – explains the thinking behind the Geese Theatre approach to applied drama with offenders and people at risk of offending, including youth offenders. More details, purchase information at this link.

     

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    Project SOAR

     

    I’ve been listening to NPR again. This time I have a report on a bonding program for children in 9 Seattle elementary schools that began in 1981. Another 9 elementary schools served as controls for the project. The Seattle Social Development Project  researchers followed the children in all 18 schools until they reached age 21. These latest results show that:

     

    • The project’s children were significantly less likely to have engaged in risky sexual behavior.

       

    • Pregnancy rates were almost 20 percent less in the young adults who had been in Project SOAR.

       

    • Birth rates were half as much as the control groups. 

       

     You can listen to the actual NPR interview with researcher David Hawkins on May 23 on the NPR web site. (You’ll need to install Real Player if you don’t have it. This is so cool!) Or, you can read about the interview at the NPR web site.

    The links to both are on the same page as the article about Hawkins' interview with Michelle Trudeau. 

    Read more about the Seattle Social Development Project here.

     

    And, you can read the abstract of the article at the Archives of Pediatrics & Adolescent Medicine web site.

     

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    Project Craft

     

    Project Craft from the Home Builder’s Institute provides at-risk teens with new skills in the home building trades, with the possibility of leading to jobs for those transitioning from residential facilities and community-supervised programs. Participants complete 21 weeks of training. They learn the basics of carpentry, building and apartment maintenance or any one of the trades.

    At the site you’ll find contact names and numbers if you want more information, plus a listing of sites where Project Craft programs are in operation.

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    Report on the Effectiveness of Youth Courts

     The Urban Institute with support from OJJDP has completed a research report that examines the successes of youth courts at four sites across the country. 

    Recidivism rates for each site were examined at six months following the teen court experience:

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

    The report is 58 pages long and downloadable and provides useful information about each teen court’s operation and locations plus appendices. Click on it from the main page. 

    At the National Youth Court Center ’s home page download a brochure describing the ABA ’s Youth Court Youth Volunteer training package. It includes a guide for trainers, youth volunteer handbooks, a video and a CD

    See also the National Youth Court Guidelines, a publication by the National Youth Court Center and APPA (American Probation and Parole Association).  In addition to the formal guidelines this publication is also loaded with handy information and tips.  Downloadable at the site or available in hard copy.

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    Protecting Children in Cyberspace: The ICAC Task Force Program - 8 page bulletin. Describes the Internet Crimes Against Children (ICAC) Task Force Program, how the ICAC program can help state and local law enforcement agencies to develop an effective response to online enticement and child pornography cases. Includes investigative, forensic, community education, and victim service components.

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    Promising Practices Network on Children, Families and Communities

    This web site highlights programs and practices that credible research indicates are effective in improving outcomes for children, youth, and families. Amazing. Absolutely amazing. Its all here. You don’t have to wonder whether the glowing report of a program or activity really works or was merely the result of wishful thinking. Everything here has already been vetted and shown to be effective. Organized into three major sections:

    • Proven and Promising Programs
    • Research in Brief
    • Strengthening Service Delivery.

    This site is a collaboration among a number of organizations include RAND, The Colorado Foundation, the Foundation Consortium, and The Family Connection Partnership.

    Under What’s New the site shows a new RAND report that identifies a set of good management practices that evidence and expert judgment indicate should be associated with quality after-school care.

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    When Grandparents are the Parents

    Western Michigan University has developed a curriculum intended to help both children and the grandparents caring for them. The curriculum says that children whose parents cannot care for them exhibit grief, fear, guilt, anger and embarrassment. Their grandparents deal with the problems of medical care for themselves and their grandchildren, housing, school issues, financial concerns, lack of support, and lifestyle. Support groups, of which children are a part, provide respite, parenting skills and knowledge, community connection and advocacy for the grandparents. The caregivers arrive with their grandchildren, then move to separate groups. The two groups come together at the end to share experiences. Support groups meet weekly for 14 weeks at a cost of between $3,000 and $4,000. For a copy of the WMU curriculum contact the Department of Family and Consumer Sciences at 616-387-3704. The cost of the curriculum is $75. Sorry, no link to follow here. 

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    Deana’s Fund: Acting to Prevent Violence

    Deana’s Fund develops and produces arts-based programs designed to prevent violence for grades k-12, colleges, workplaces and communities. The organization uses live theater and the arts to focus on key social and school safety issues. Productions include The Yellow Dress, a drama which brings knowledge about dating abuse and violence to students; Doin’ the Right Thing, which deals with teasing, harassment and bullying; and All Stars, which helps young students understand about the difference between teasing and bullying and tattling vs. telling. The Fund was founded in 1994 by family and friends of Deana Brisbois, a young woman from Massachusetts who was a victim of dating violence. Visit the Deana’s Fund web site.

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    A National Study Comparing the Environments of Boot Camps with Traditional Facilities for Juvenile Offenders - A NIJ Research in Brief, the study compares 27 boot camps with 22 more traditional facilities. It concludes that boot camps are viewed more favorably by juveniles and staff, but are no more effective in reducing recidivism than are traditional facilities. 12 pages, downloadable.

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    The Unusual Suspects Theatre Company

    Its mission statement:

    "The Unusual Suspects Theatre Company exists to bring theatre arts to at-risk teens. Through improvisation and writing exercises, professionals in the arts work to help young people create original theatre and to foster pride, self confidence and racial tolerance".

    This Los Angeles program began with volunteers, professional actors, directors, writers and others working with at-risk youth ages 14-18 years old in foster homes and placement facilities. After six years the program branched out to work in Central Juvenile Hall with kids who are awaiting trial for murder and attempted murder. Approximately 200 kids go through the Unusual Suspects program each year.

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    Web Site of Note: The Illinois Youth Court Association  promotes interagency cooperation and information sharing among the 70 teen-court programs in Illinois. It provides technical assistance to the youth courts and encourages the development of new youth courts. Nine other states have statewide associations for their youth courts: Alaska, Colorado, Florida, Missouri, North Carolina, New Mexico, Oregon, Texas and Wisconsin. 

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    Teen Court

    The National Youth Court Center at the American Probation and Parole Association (APPA) provides training and technical assistance and serves as an information clearinghouse to youth court programs in the United States. Information at that site says that there are more than 730 active youth court programs in United States, with more in the process of development.

    The National Youth Court Center published the National Youth Court Guidelines, a manual "designed to give youth courts direction for developing and operating effective programs." The Guidelines can be downloaded at the site or the hard copy version can be obtained through the National Youth Court Center.

    Also available at the Center’s web site, publications and articles, including the opportunity to see a prepublication version of a new publication, The Role of Restorative Justice in Teen Courts: A Preliminary Look. The site announces regional training opportunities and provides a good source for the exchange of information and ideas.

    Related sites:

    Minnesota Teen Courts - information about teen courts and their operations in the state of Minnesota.

    Charlotte County Teen Court - Web page about the teen court in Punta Gorda, Florida. Includes descriptions of bailiff, clerk, attorney, juror roles, the confidentiality oath, requirements for teen volunteers, and other good information.

    Teen Courts: A Focus on Research - (NCJ 183472) - Examines the popularity of teen courts and cautions that little empirical data exists to evaluate the effectiveness of this peer-centered intervention.  What we have is mostly anecdotal reports. 

    APPA also published Peer Justice and Youth Empowerment: An Implementation Guide for Teen Court Programs. It can be downloaded from NCJRS or ordered  from NCJRS in hard copy as well.  See ordering information at the bottom of this page.

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    Florida’s ARISE Foundation for Life Skills Education - ARISE works with youth with delinquent behavior, alcohol and drug abuse, domestic violence, unwillingness to stay in school, and the inability to curb anger. ARISE works with these juveniles to rethink and reorient their attitudes toward themselves and the world. Through its Secrets of Success programs, ARISE presents interactive lessons to combat and overcome the difficulties of troubled backgrounds. The ARISE curriculum has been in used in Florida juvenile justice facilities since 1996.ARISE zeroes in on strengthening communication skills, introducing basic social skills, plus some 250+ life-management lessons.

    ARISE programs have been evaluated by the University of Miami Department of Sociology for the past four years. A report is available on the ARISE web site. For more information contact Edmund Benson:  

    • email:    edmundbenson@ariselife-skills.org
    • phone:     305-592-7473 or 1-888-680-61`00
    • mail:    4001 Edmund F. Benson Blvd., Miami FL 33178

    Check out ARISE on the web.

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    Pet Assisted Therapy - You've heard of the use of pets therapeutically among the elderly, the ill and the physically and emotionally challenged. Here are some samples of programs in juvenile justice and related settings which use animals in therapy and to encourage behavioral change.

    Project Pooch - brings juvenile offenders together with dogs from the local Humane Society in a program combining obedience training and pet therapy. 

    Paws in the Classroom - The classroom teacher, a facilitator, volunteers from the Pet Therapy Society of Northern Alberta and their dogs work together in junior high school classroom presentations. 

    Chicago's Chenny Troupe - Dogs and volunteers work at eight Chicago area programs. They include a program for teenage girls in a substance abuse inpatient facility, a program for young men 17 to 25 in an inpatient substance abuse program, and a program at a rehab center for physically and emotionally challenged children.

    Friends for Life: A Juvenile Intervention Program Using Animal Assisted Therapy - Description of an animal-assisted therapy program offered by The Haven in North Carolina.  

    High Schooled Assistance Dog (HS A-dog) - A supplemental treatment program for adjudicated youth, chronic truants, severe emotionally disturbed students and other troubled youth. The program pairs at-risk youth with puppies specifically bred to become service dogs.  

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    Street Law offers educational materials and programs in the following areas:

    • developing legal life skills and practical understanding of the law
    • educating about human rights and democracy
    • preventing youth crime and violence
    • developing youth leadership and advocacy skills
    • addressing the special needs of teen parents
    • teaching teachers about the U.S. Supreme Court

    Publications intended specifically for youth in the juvenile justice system include the Save Our Streets curriculum, which was originally developed for youth arrested on weapons violations and Street Law in Juvenile Court Alternative Programs which teaches conflict resolution, communication and problem solving skills.

    The core publication, Street Law: A Course in Practical Law, includes interactive web-based lessons for each unit of the text. Also available, a teacher’s manual and other resources. For grades 9-12.

    While you’re there take a look at the Open Society Institute, a special division of Street Law which supports programs in civic and law-related education in Eastern and Central Europe, newly independent states, and Mongolia. The Street Law Network Program helps educators, Lawyers, and non-governmental organization leaders develop curricula that educate students on the daily applicability of the principles of human rights, democracy, and the rule of law.

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    Youth as Resources - This organization provides crime-prevention and community development grants to juvenile correctional facilities and youth-led organizations. YAR is at about 70 sites nationwide, with local groups offering grants totaling about $25,000 nationally (average grant: $500) Each site is composed of a board of children and adults. Each site raises all funds locally and redistributes them in the form of grants to a variety of projects.

    In the correctional facilities program detailed youth are responsible for every state of project development. They conduct an assessment of community needs, formulate project ideas, draft a proposal and budget and present their ideas, in person, to a local YAR board. In one such program former female gang members worked with the local sheriff’s department, a hospital and a television station to produce a video depicting the stories of their incarcerations.

    YAR encourages juvenile correctional facilities around the country to contact their national office for details on funding opportunities. For more information on correctional and community funding opportunities contact Youth As Resources.

     
  ++++++++++ The Geese Theatre Company is a theatrical company committed to pursuing a multi-agency approach to working with offenders and other groups uses three key devices in its performances: with built-in strategies that make interaction with audiences possible and enable them to shape the outcome of scenes and the plays’ conclusions. Geese Theatre was established in the United States in 1980 and in the United Kingdom in 1987. The links here are to Geese Theatre in the U.K. Two publications from Geese Theatre U.K. may be of particular interest to readers: ++++++++++ I’ve been listening to NPR again. This time I have a report on a for children in 9 Seattle elementary schools that began in 1981. Another 9 elementary schools served as controls for the project. The Seattle Social Development Project  . These latest results show that: You on May 23 on the NPR web site. (You’ll need to install Real Player if you don’t have it. This is so cool!) Or, you And, you at the Archives of Pediatrics & Adolescent Medicine web site. Recidivism rates for each site were examined at six months following the teen court experience: