From Bellwether Education:
Executive Summary
Today, and on any given day, tens of thousands of students are attending school behind bars. Although all incarcerated youth are entitled to education opportunities under federal and state laws, very few of them receive the kinds of high-quality programs that they need. For many of them, this may be their last, and their best, chance to prepare for a healthy transition to adulthood. And it’s being squandered.
Despite the steady decline in youth incarceration during the past two decades, the best estimate suggests that there were nearly a quarter of a million instances of
young person being detained or committed to a juvenile facility in 2019. Students in juvenile justice education programs are disproportionately youth of color, youth who are (or who are perceived to be) LGBTQIA+, and students with Disabilities. Juvenile justice education fails many of these students every day, leading to serious long-term consequences for many of our most vulnerable and
marginalized youth.
State policymakers are responsible for creating the policy conditions that ensure these programs are effective, but the task is a difficult one, given that the underlying policy design of juvenile justice education is fundamentally flawed. Although juvenile justice education programs are operated by local education agencies (LEAs) and are called schools, the waivers, exceptions, and fragmentation
of leadership in juvenile justice settings makes it nearly impossible for educators to create conditions that approach those of “a school,” let alone to provide high-quality education programming.
Continue reading the full report here.
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