Juvenile Justice Applied Leadership Network Grant

The Juvenile Justice Applied Leadership Network, supported by the Annie E. Casey Foundation, fosters collaboration among teams of juvenile justice leaders to improve outcomes for at-risk youth. Over a 14-month program, participants identify and implement meaningful changes, focusing on community-based approaches for young Black and Latino men. Teams are encouraged to include diverse voices and foster partnerships that promote equity and well-being, ultimately aiming to prevent legal system involvement and enhance community support for youth.

NOTE: In-per­son atten­dance is manda­to­ry at each sem­i­nar. Gen­er­al­ly, teams will trav­el and arrive the day or evening pri­or to the first day of the sem­i­nars.
About ALN
ALN is root­ed in Casey’s Results Count® lead­er­ship devel­op­ment approach and seeks to equip lead­ers with the skills and strate­gies need­ed to advance pow­er­ful, mea­sur­able and equi­table results on behalf of young peo­ple who are fac­ing steep bar­ri­ers to suc­cess.
Today’s ALN alum­ni base spans 53 lead­ers in 21 states. As ALN alum­ni, these lead­ers have access to peer sup­port and a col­lab­o­ra­tive learn­ing mod­el that helps them con­tin­ue to employ a results-dri­ven frame­work in their home organizations.
What to Expect
Dur­ing the 14-month pro­gram, par­tic­i­pants will iden­ti­fy the changes they want to achieve with­in their sys­tem and com­mu­ni­ty. Team mem­bers will then work togeth­er to devise, imple­ment, refine and mon­i­tor their progress toward mean­ing­ful change.
For the Class 5 cycle, Casey is par­tic­u­lar­ly inter­est­ed in ele­vat­ing com­mu­ni­ty-based approach­es that will improve out­comes for young black men and young Lati­no men. Such efforts may seek to pre­vent police encoun­ters, divert can­di­dates away from the legal sys­tem or sup­port sim­i­lar changes that can help lev­el life’s play­ing field for these at-risk youth.
Selection Criteria
The Juve­nile Jus­tice Applied Lead­er­ship Net­work is for teams from juris­dic­tions seek­ing to advance the well-being of youth involved with or at risk of involve­ment with the juve­nile jus­tice sys­tem. ALN is seek­ing juris­dic­tions that are — or are inter­est­ed in — pro­mot­ing com­mu­ni­ty-based approach­es and pro­grams that divert young peo­ple before they are ever referred to the legal sys­tem and pre­vent young peo­ple from encoun­ter­ing police in the first place. Prospec­tive juris­dic­tions should be inter­est­ed in chang­ing the poli­cies, prac­tices and orga­ni­za­tion­al cul­ture of their juve­nile jus­tice sys­tem to sig­nif­i­cant­ly shrink the foot­print of the sys­tem; reduce all forms of con­fine­ment; pro­mote heal­ing and reha­bil­i­ta­tion for youth with the most seri­ous offense his­to­ries; and strength­en their part­ner­ships with com­mu­ni­ty groups.
A Focus on Diversion and Prevention
For this ALN class, there is spe­cif­ic inter­est in teams that seek to estab­lish a con­tin­u­um of pre­ven­tion and diver­sion process­es to hold youth account­able for their behav­ior with­out resort­ing to legal sanc­tions, court over­sight or the threat of con­fine­ment. Instead, com­mu­ni­ties would address pre­dictable ado­les­cent mis­be­hav­ior out­side of the court sys­tem with com­mu­ni­ty-cen­tered approach­es and assets. Respons­es would include sur­round­ing youth most at risk for jus­tice sys­tem involve­ment, specif­i­cal­ly Black and Lati­no young men, with the pos­i­tive con­nec­tions and oppor­tu­ni­ties that have the high­est like­li­hood of max­i­miz­ing young people’s success.

Eligibility

ALN appli­cants should be teams of juve­nile jus­tice sys­tem lead­ers, com­mu­ni­ty lead­ers and oth­ers who are work­ing to sup­port young peo­ple at risk of or already expe­ri­enc­ing legal sys­tem involve­ment.A team should have between four and six mem­bers who rep­re­sent the con­tin­u­um of sup­port from pre­ven­tion to reen­try after con­fine­ment for youth and young adults involved with or at risk of involve­ment with the jus­tice system.Prospec­tive teams must include at least one mem­ber from the juve­nile jus­tice or pro­ba­tion agency and should con­sid­er includ­ing mem­bers from relat­ed pub­lic sys­tems and com­mu­ni­ty-based orga­ni­za­tions, such as the fol­low­ing types of stakeholders:grass­roots or com­mu­ni­ty-based orga­ni­za­tions serv­ing young peo­ple or com­mu­ni­ty interests;
advo­cates for social jus­tice and racial jus­tice, includ­ing faith-based groups;
youth-serv­ing sys­tems, such as edu­ca­tion, child wel­fare, work­force devel­op­ment or employ­ment; and
young lead­ers active in their com­mu­ni­ties, espe­cial­ly in com­mu­ni­ties most affect­ed by the legal sys­tem, or peo­ple with direct expe­ri­ence in the youth jus­tice system.In com­pos­ing the team, con­sid­er two or more mem­bers who have pre­vi­ous­ly worked well togeth­er to advance pos­i­tive change. The team com­po­si­tion should reflect the fol­low­ing characteristics:Racial, eth­nic and gen­der diversity
Reform-mind­ed orientation
Strong ori­en­ta­tion to equi­ty and well-being for young peo­ple and fam­i­lies who face the steep­est bar­ri­ers to success
Prac­tice and expe­ri­ence using data to inform decision-making
Will­ing­ness to build part­ner­ships between com­mu­ni­ty (e.g., fam­i­ly, youth, com­mu­ni­ty) and pub­lic systems
Action-ori­ent­ed, bold and able to use influ­ence and lead­er­ship to make a mea­sur­able differenceTeam mem­bers should have the autho­riza­tion, time and com­mit­ment to ful­ly par­tic­i­pate in the pro­gram and have a role and the author­i­ty (for­mal or infor­mal) to make changes and deci­sions in their sys­tem or com­mu­ni­ty and move the work back home.Teams can apply regard­less of their jurisdiction’s con­nec­tion to the Casey’s Juve­nile Deten­tion Alter­na­tives Ini­tia­tive® or pro­ba­tion trans­for­ma­tion site work.