Domestic Grantmaking : Juvenile Justice : Grantmaking Guidelines

Juvenile Justice
Grantmaking Guidelines

For more information

Questions about this grantmaking area can be addressed to Director of Juvenile Justice Laurie Garduque, Program Officer Cathryn Crawford, or Program Officer Candice Jones.

Questions about Models for Change in the states can be directed to Robert Schwartz at the Juvenile Law Center (Pennsylvania), Lisa Jacobs at Loyola University (Illinois), Debra DePrato at the Board of Regents (Louisiana), and Michael Curtis at the Children and Youth Justice Center (Washington).

Overview

Justice systems across the U.S. increasingly treat juvenile offenders as if they were adults, prosecuting them in adult courts, imposing harsher sentences, and often jailing them with adults. These policies fail to recognize the developmental differences between young people and adults. The result is high costs to individuals and society — costs that receive little public scrutiny. The disproportionate weight of punitive policies borne by minority youths is of special concern.

The premise of the work in juvenile justice is that an understanding of the scientific research on child and adolescent development will help decision makers develop more effective policies and practices and make more rational choices in individual cases. MacArthur supports research, training, practical interventions, policy analysis, and public education. The goal of this work is to promote a fair, rational, and effective juvenile justice system that is linked to other relevant agencies and organizations and is held accountable for public safety and the rehabilitation of young offenders.

In 2010, the grant budget for this program area is $24.5 million.

What MacArthur Funds

Models of Systems Reform

Through Models for Change: Systems Reform in Juvenile Justice, the Foundation is supporting efforts in key states to bring about changes in law, policy, and practice, thereby heightening interest and providing models for juvenile justice reform across the country. Specific areas of reform include greater use of evidence-based practices, improving aftercare and mental health services and increasing community-based alternatives to secure confinement. All sites are working to improve data collection and analysis for decision making and to eliminate racial and ethnic disparities.

Models for Change is active in sixteen states, including Pennsylvania, Illinois, Louisiana, and Washington, as well as California, Colorado, Connecticut, Florida, Kansas, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Jersey, North Carolina, Ohio, Texas, and Wisconsin, through “action networks” focused on racial and ethnic disparities, mental health services, and the quality of juvenile indigent defense.

In 2010, the Foundation will begin an effort to share the lessons of Models for Change with other states and localities, with the hope of helping to harness and accelerate a wave of juvenile justice reform across the country.

See Recent Grants for examples of grants awarded.

Research

The Foundation supports research to inform the development of effective juvenile justice policies and practices. Grantmaking has included support for the Research Network on Adolescent Development and Juvenile Justice, whose research addressed the competence of young people to stand trial, youthful immaturity and criminal responsibility, and desistance from criminal behavior. More recent research is examining the process and effectiveness of systems reform in the Models for Change states, including studies of the consequences of mental health screening in pretrial detention, risk/needs assessment, financing systems change, benefit-cost analysis of juvenile justice programs and services, and interactions between schools and juvenile justice.