School Discipline and Juvenile Justice

This study seeks to examine the educational and criminal justice trajectories of youth who have been arrested as juveniles or young adults. At the broadest level, the goal is to better understand how interaction with the juvenile (criminal) justice system influences educational outcomes and, conversely, how a young person’s success in the educational domain impacts the likelihood he or she will interact with the juvenile justice system.

Children can face lifelong impacts from their interactions with the criminal justice system. Unlike adults, the State of Michigan has no agency responsible for representation of juvenile defendants, nor standards for indigent youth defense. Currently, whether or not youth receive representation at their first court appearance varies by county. YPL is partnering with the Juvenile Justice Clinic (JJC) at the University of Michigan Law School to evaluate their CAFA pilot intervention in select Michigan counties. Through this pilot, juvenile defendants facing felony charges are offered representat...