Evaluation of Judicially Led Responses to Eliminate School Pathways to the Juvenile Justice System

• In Event: Advancing Equitable Access to Supportive School Discipline and Education: Challenging the School to Prison Pipeline

Abstract

Researchers at the National Council of Juvenile and Family Court Judges are evaluating a three-year project entitled: Judicially Led Responses to Eliminate School Pathways to the Juvenile Justice (School Pathways Project) that is currently funded by Atlantic Philanthropies, Open Society Foundation, and Public Welfare Foundation. This project provides selected jurisdictions struggling with school disengagement issues with intensive, judicially-led training and technical assistance to improve disciplinary practices. The evaluators will monitor quantitative data related to outcome measures, including suspension rates, expulsion rates, and juvenile justice referrals by race/ethnicity where data is available. The population of interest is secondary students in 16 geographically and population diverse jurisdictions in the United States. With Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention funding to support the enhancement of the evaluation design, the researchers randomly assigned 8 of the participating secondary schools to the treatment group and 8 to the control group (for delayed intervention) to better assess the impact of this intervention on self-reported stakeholders' behaviors and attitudes regarding the retention and attrition of students, suspensions, expulsions, and referrals. The enhanced evaluation will help develop additional evidence to guide the field to eliminate the school-to-juvenile justice pipeline.

Author

• Shawn Marsh, National Council of Juvenile and Family Court Judges