Casey Awards Grants to Juvenile Justice Reform Projects Led by Young People

The Annie E. Casey Foun­da­tion announced fund­ing for three juve­nile jus­tice reform projects led by youth and young adults who have per­son­al expe­ri­ence with the jus­tice sys­tem. Seek­ing to ele­vate the voic­es and lead­er­ship poten­tial of these young peo­ple, the Foun­da­tion issued a request for pro­pos­als with the help of alum­ni from Casey’s Juve­nile Jus­tice Youth Advi­so­ry Coun­cil.

The three grantees are the Cen­ter for Jus­tice-Impact­ed Stu­dents at Mid­dle­sex Col­lege in New Jer­sey, the Legal Aid Soci­ety in New York City and the Final 5 Cam­paign in Illi­nois. They were select­ed from a pool of 64 pro­pos­als by coun­cil alum­ni, Foun­da­tion staff and oth­ers. Each will receive a $50,000 grant.

“We received a strong response to the request for pro­pos­als, many of which were quite good,” says David E. Brown, senior asso­ciate with the Foundation’s Juve­nile Jus­tice Strat­e­gy Group. ​“The grantees we chose demon­strat­ed the high­est lev­el of youth engage­ment and lead­er­ship by youth affect­ed by the juve­nile jus­tice system.”

The Casey Foundation’s Juve­nile Jus­tice Reform Grantees

The Foun­da­tion fund­ed the fol­low­ing projects:

• Col­lab­o­ra­tive Exchange: Envi­sion­ing a New High­er Edu­ca­tion­al Path­way Designed for and by Jus­tice-Impact­ed Youth — Cen­ter for Jus­tice-Impact­ed Stu­dents, Mid­dle­sex Col­lege, Edi­son, New Jer­sey. Access to high­er edu­ca­tion has proven ben­e­fits for youth in cus­tody and the com­mu­ni­ties to which they even­tu­al­ly return. To ensure that high­er edu­ca­tion remains a pri­or­i­ty for young peo­ple with jus­tice sys­tem involve­ment, the Mid­dle­sex Col­lege Col­lab­o­ra­tive Exchange pro­vides inten­sive sup­port to two groups of young peo­ple — for­mer­ly incar­cer­at­ed and cur­rent­ly in cus­tody — who are attend­ing col­lege. They learn to advo­cate for them­selves and sim­i­lar­ly sit­u­at­ed young peo­ple by research­ing resources for — and bar­ri­ers to — high­er edu­ca­tion for peo­ple with records. The Casey grant will be used to com­pen­sate par­tic­i­pants for their time, labor and exper­tise, as well as fund­ing hon­o­raria for guest speak­ers and enrich­ment pro­gram­ming iden­ti­fied and designed by the youth lead­ers. The project will cul­mi­nate in a meet­ing with the New Jer­sey Juve­nile Jus­tice Com­mis­sion and state-lev­el rep­re­sen­ta­tives, where the young lead­ers will present their find­ings and offer con­crete sug­ges­tions to sup­port the reen­try needs and aca­d­e­m­ic inter­ests of stu­dents with jus­tice sys­tem involvement.


• The Youth Lead­er­ship Board’s Set the Record Straight Peer Out­reach Cam­paign — The Legal Aid Soci­ety, New York, New York. This project is led by the society’s Youth Lead­er­ship Board (YLB) — a diverse group of cur­rent and for­mer clients aged 16–24 who have been involved with the juve­nile jus­tice and child wel­fare sys­tems. It will use peer out­reach so young peo­ple under­stand their rights, the con­se­quences of a crim­i­nal or juve­nile record and how to mit­i­gate a record’s impact on their lives. The project tar­gets young peo­ple at risk of involve­ment and those who have already had con­tact with the jus­tice sys­tem. It pro­motes Legal Aid’s ser­vices to resolve errors in juve­nile arrest his­to­ries and ensure that arrest records for juve­nile delin­quen­cy are treat­ed con­fi­den­tial­ly. More­over, it pre­vents young peo­ple with juve­nile arrest records from expe­ri­enc­ing unlaw­ful dis­crim­i­na­tion by employ­ers, schools and law enforce­ment agen­cies. Mem­bers of YLB, who will be paid for their work, will gain pro­fes­sion­al and per­son­al skills as they devel­op and exe­cute the youth out­reach cam­paign. The soci­ety expects the cam­paign will include PSA-style videos, writ­ten mate­ri­als and in-per­son events.


• Restora­tive Path­ways to Youth Futures — The Final 5 Cam­paign, Illi­nois. A move­ment to close the state’s five youth pris­ons and increase com­mu­ni­ty-based invest­ments in pos­i­tive oppor­tu­ni­ties for young peo­ple, the Final 5 Cam­paign draws atten­tion to the expe­ri­ences of youth who have been incar­cer­at­ed to gen­er­ate pub­lic sup­port for its mis­sion. Restora­tive Path­ways to Youth Futures will engage both youths who are cur­rent­ly in cus­tody and those who were for­mer­ly incar­cer­at­ed in devel­op­ing ini­tia­tives that offer resources, peer sup­port and lead­er­ship devel­op­ment oppor­tu­ni­ties for young peo­ple across the state who have been incar­cer­at­ed. The par­tic­i­pat­ing young peo­ple will simul­ta­ne­ous­ly push for changes in prac­tice and pol­i­cy while sup­port­ing direct­ly affect­ed indi­vid­u­als and com­mu­ni­ties. They will deter­mine project activ­i­ties, which might include com­mu­ni­ty events to engage and sup­port youth and fam­i­lies, train­ings or work­shops and paid intern­ships and fel­low­ships. The young peo­ple will use their expe­ri­ences to devel­op rec­om­men­da­tions for endur­ing solutions. 

Pro­pos­al Design Informed by Youth Coun­cil Members

Der­rell Fra­zier, Iliana Pujols and Ine­sha Brig­gs — alum­ni of Casey’s Juve­nile Jus­tice Youth Advi­so­ry Coun­cil — played a lead­ing role in the ini­tial request for pro­pos­als and the selec­tion of these three projects. ​“Young peo­ple who have expe­ri­ence with the juve­nile jus­tice sys­tem have a unique and valu­able per­spec­tive to con­tribute to reform efforts,” says Fra­zier. ​“Cen­ter­ing authen­tic youth voice and lead­er­ship in these efforts is essen­tial to pro­vid­ing young peo­ple with the oppor­tu­ni­ty to shape their lives and com­mu­ni­ties.” A fel­low alum­nus of Casey’s youth advi­so­ry coun­cil — Ja’Vaune ​“Jay” Jack­son — is one of the lead­ers of the Final 5 Campaign.

Restora­tive Response Bal­ti­more (RRB), a con­flict res­o­lu­tion and com­mu­ni­ty-build­ing orga­ni­za­tion that is a Casey Foun­da­tion grantee, helped to man­age the RFP and selec­tion process. RRB was the youth advi­so­ry council’s back­bone orga­ni­za­tion and con­tin­ues to work with Casey and coun­cil alum­ni on projects fos­ter­ing authen­tic youth engagement.