Recent news

On April 17, 2012, a young black man was shot and killed in Southwest Philadelphia. What made this killing different from the 400+ shootings every year involving a young black man? Nothing and yet, everything.

Juvenile Law Center is seeking a student to join our team and assist with writing abstracts/summaries for publications in our Resource Index, an in-house online collection of essays, journal articles, reports and studies, selected from many publication sources and assigned to one or more of over sixty subject areas. 

Interested in joining one of Juvenile Law Center's youth engagement programs, Juveniles for Justice or Youth Fostering Change? Here's your chance!

On August 7, State Policy Advocacy and Reform Center (SPARC) and the Annie E. Casey Foundation, together with the Legal Center for Foster Care and Education (a collaboration of the American Bar Association, Juvenile Law Center, and Education Law Center-PA), hosted a webinar on state implementation of the Uninterrupted Scholars Act. If you missed it, you can view the recording here. 

In late June-early July, my husband, Philadelphia Public Defender Tom Innes, and I traveled to Okinawa and Tokyo, Japan to teach trial advocacy, and lecture on both the American juvenile justice system and the "kids-for-cash" scandal in Luzerne County, Pennsylvania.

In a disappointing and surprising move, the New Jersey Department of Education (NJDOE) recently issued a proposal to expand its definition of "alternative education" while eliminating regulations governing alternative schools in New Jersey.

Nationally, nearly half of youth who age out of foster care will not complete high school on time. Youth in congregate care facilities often face the toughest educational challenges. 

On July 30, from 12 - 1:30 PM, Juvenile Law Center and Education Law Center-PA are hosting a free webinar to provide information on how you can protect and advance the education rights of your clients who are in congregate care in Pennsylvania.

The Legal Intelligencer, the oldest law journal in the United States, presented Juvenile Law Center Deputy Director and Chief Counsel Marsha Levick with its inaugural Arlen Specter Award in a ceremony on Thursday, June 27. 

One year ago, the U.S. Supreme Court declared that mandatory life without parole sentences for youth were unconstitutional. The Court ruled that mandatory sentencing of children restricts a judge's ability to consider the child's mitigating circumstances, maturity, or ability to be rehabilitated. The Court noted that juvenile life without parole (JLWOP) sentences should be rare.

The Supreme Court did not, however, address several related issues.

Imagine going through school without an adult to consistently look out for you. Children rely on involved adults to make education decisions on their behalf and ensure that schools meet their needs. Adults have roles that range from routine to critical—from signing field trip permission forms, to ensuring a child is in the correct grade, classes and school, to making sure credits transfer when a child changes schools, to protecting the child’s rights to special education services and due process protections in the school discipline context. 

Unfortunately, children in foster care—especially those living  in residential facilities such as group homes, residential treatment facilities, and hospitals—often have no adult in their lives to serve this role.