Social and emotional learning (SEL) has been used in many K-12 schools across the United States to improve academic and nonacademic outcomes. Extensive research affirms SEL’s benefits for students in educational settings. However, there is a research gap in adaptations of SEL for alternate settings. This article conceptualizes a SEL framework for justice-involved youth on community supervision to support rehabilitation efforts in the juvenile justice system (JJS). Integrating SEL into JJS may reduce recidivism and help justice-involved youth develop the skills to reintegrate into society successfully.
Services to Meet the Needs of Special Populations
Essential Elements of a Trauma-Informed Juvenile Justice System
Trauma-informed policies and procedures make juvenile justice organizations safer and more effective by ensuring the physical and psychological safety of all youth, family members, and staff and promoting their recovery from the adverse effects of trauma. Juvenile justice policies and procedures are trauma-informed when they establish—at every level in the organization—a culture that (1) recognizes the adverse effects of trauma on youth, families, and staff; (2) that requires and supports operational practices that consistently prevent further traumatization; and (3) that supports healing and recovery of all trauma-affected individuals in the organization.
Roadmap for Foster Care and K–12 Data Linkages: Key Focus Areas to Ensure Quality Implementation
By sharing data, child welfare and education agencies can work together to significantly improve educational outcomes for students in foster care.1 These students are often highly mobile and need the coordinated help of both agencies to make smooth transitions between schools, identify and address educational needs, address attendance and discipline issues, ensure student engagement and successful progression toward a high school credential, and more. States need to securely link key foster care and K–12 data to ensure that students in foster care are supported throughout their education with access to a full range of educational opportunities, including higher education.
On Track: How well are states preparing youth in the juvenile justice system for employment?
Perhaps no group of young people faces more daunting barriers to achieving their career goals than youth in the juvenile justice system. More than 30,000 youth are incarcerated in the United States every year, and more than 325,000 are placed on some form of probation. Increasingly, these youth are older and seeking to enter the workforce—as of 2015, approximately 75 percent of incarcerated youth and 50 percent of all youth adjudicated to any level of supervision were age 16 and over. Yet,
these youth are disproportionately likely, compared to their peers that are not involved in the justice system, to face an array of barriers to transitioning to a crime-free, productive adulthood.
Credit Overdue: How States Can Mitigate Academic Credit Transfer Problems for Youth in the Juvenile Justice System
On any given day across the country, more than 48,000 youth are confined to juvenile justice facilities, where they are held for weeks, or even months at a time, research shows. These youth are held in facilities that not only take them away from their homes, but also their schools. And while these facilities provide classes to prevent
young people from falling behind in their schoolwork, many return to their schools to discover that they did not receive full academic credit for their work, that there is no record of their credits or that their credits will not count toward graduation. In other words, they discover that despite their best efforts to succeed, the juvenile justice system
failed them. In fact, research spanning the last 20 years — including anecdotal reports from youth, families, advocates and others — describes rampant credit transfer problems.
The Relationship Between Student Experiences and Outcomes
In 2021, Transcend launched the Leaps Student Voice Survey, a valid and reliable tool to gather evidence about the quality of students’ learning experiences. They recently conducted analyses to better understand the relationship between students’ experiences in school, as measured by the Leaps Student Voice Survey, and a range of important outcomes. This research brief shares the findings of those analyses.
Revisiting California’s Invisible Achievement Gap: Trends in Education Outcomes of Students in Foster Care in the Context of the Local Control Funding Formula
The Efficacy of a Literacy Intervention for Incarcerated Adolescents
This randomized trial with repeated measures investigated the efficacy of a literacy intervention for low-performing readers in a juvenile corrections setting over a 31-month period. Students were randomly assigned to treatment or treatment-as-usual conditions. This article examines treatment effects using curriculum-based measures of comprehension, oral reading fluency, and spelling and standardized diagnostic reading and language assessments. Significant differences in favor of the treatment group were found with reading comprehension and language. Findings are discussed in the context of literacy instruction for male students in small long-term juvenile correctional facilities.
Addressing the Civil Rights of Students with Sickle Cell Disease, Epilepsy, and Cancer
The U.S. Department of Education OCR released three resources with information for students, parents and families, and schools addressing the civil rights of students with sickle cell disease, epilepsy, and cancer.
Supporting Success: Attendance Solutions for Multilingual Students
This brief examines chronic absenteeism among multilingual learners in the U.S., with a particular focus on the post-COVID-19 era. It highlights the varied challenges these students face, which range from language barriers and cultural differences to socioeconomic difficulties. Highlighting the importance of creating welcoming environments and forging strong community ties, the brief advocates for comprehensive support measures to help multilingual learners navigate challenges and achieve academic success.
