The 30th Annual Louisiana Governor’s Conference on Juvenile Justice Showcases the Best and Brightest of the Juvenile Justice Reform Movement
Mar 29, 2010, Louisiana Models for Change
The 30th Annual Louisiana Governor’s Conference on Juvenile Justice, held earlier this month in New Orleans, Louisiana, proved to be a defining moment in the state’s juvenile justice reform movement to date. The conference, sponsored by the Governor’s Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention Advisory Board, John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation’s Models for Change Initiative and the Louisiana Commission on Law Enforcement U.S. Department of Justice, Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention, served as a showcase platform for the leading advocates and experts in the juvenile justice arena and was an ideal venue for the exchange of new ideas and the sharing of tangible success stories and testimonials.
In addition to its vast array of speakers, the conference featured plenary sessions focusing on the themes of helping at-risk youth, family engagement strategies in juvenile justice as a critical component of success, the effectiveness of evidence-based programming and new alternatives to formal processing. Conference participants included staff members from various juvenile justice stakeholders, including the Juvenile Justice Project of Louisiana, the Justice Policy Institute, the Louisiana District Attorney’s Association and the Louisiana Office of Juvenile Justice, among others.
Attendees heard impactful stories from youth, counselors, advocates, probation and treatment officers and law enforcement, discussing effective methods of intervention, success stories and new ideas to implement meaningful juvenile justice reform measures. Members of the National Resource Bank, a group of nationally recognized organizations that serve as a direct source of knowledge for juvenile justice issues, were also present at the meeting, offering their expert opinion on various issues and also fielding audience inquiries.
The conference also saw local entities providing remarks on various subjects, including Calcasieu Parish Office of Juvenile Justice Services Dane Bolin describing the importance of data utilization in driving reform organizations, while also improving practices and outcomes. Jefferson Parish Department of Juvenile Services Director Roy Juncker also spoke during the conference about the significant challenges facing probation departments, and offered insight on handling the day-to-day pressures of handling cases while simultaneously satisfying the public and oversight bodies’ demands and expectations for consistent positive outcomes. Another session featured Louisiana Children’s Cabinet Executive Director Karen Stubbs, a key member of Governor Bobby Jindal’s administration, offering valuable information and tales of experience about the creation and sustaining of legislatively mandated children and youth planning boards (CYPBs). Stubbs presented on the role of the CYPBs in assessing and coordinating all the available services and programs necessary to address the needs of children in their respective local communities. Stubbs, in her role as head of the state’s Children’s Cabinet provides continuous individualized direction and technical direction to regional CYPBs, as well as for general youth services around Louisiana.
One of the conference’s highlights was a keynote presentation from national expert Phillipe B. Cunningham, Ph.D., a professor in the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences at the Medical University of South Carolina. In addition to his duties as a professor, Cunningham also works in the university’s Family Research Center. His presentation, entitled “Enhancing Family Engagement in Juvenile Justice: Techniques and Strategies” offered expert insight, as well as goals and objectives on participation and interaction between therapists and clients interacting in treatment services through family engagement.
During his talk, Cunningham outlined several goals critical to the success of increased and enhanced family engagement in therapeutic services. Broadly defined, “engagement” is a treatment process whereby the professional and a youth make a commitment to work together to accomplish mutually agreed upon goals. Cunningham emphasized that in addition to the mutual goals between therapists and youths in treatment, each therapist should strive to achieve their own additional set of goals for best outcomes, including: revisiting the importance of family engagement in juvenile justice treatment programs, describing factors that contribute to poor family engagement, illustrating engagement strategies used in several evidence-based family intervention models and ultimately providing the practical strategies and suggestions for juvenile justice professionals seeking to enhance family engagement in therapeutic or treatment settings.
The best strategies to overcome the myriad of challenges that beset family engagement effectiveness are clarification of roles, setting the foundation for collaborative working relationship, identification of concrete, practical issues that can be immediately addressed and the development of a plan to overcome barriers to ongoing involvement with the agency. According to Cunningham, these proposed solutions to disengagement can be applied to the parents, youths and therapists in a treatment setting. With these principles applied, empirical evidence has overwhelmingly shown increases in both program retention and completion, the critical elements of youth treatment success, explained Cunningham. More than evidence and statistics, Cunningham also touted his 15 years of experience in supervising and consulting with families and clinicians in the juvenile justice system as further proof of the effectiveness of these programs and the criticalness of these alternatives and solutions.
- Issues
-
Community-based alternatives
, Evidence-based practices
, Mental health
- States
-
Louisiana
- Action networks
-
Indigent Defense Action Network
, Mental Health / Juvenile Justice Action Network