OJJDP Research Highlighted at American Society of Criminology Meeting

The American Society of Criminology’s (ASC’s) meeting on November 19–22, 2014, featured 20 sessions which highlighted recent developments in OJJDP-funded research. The session topics included supportive school discipline; Hispanics in the juvenile justice system; mentoring; and OJJDP’s Model Programs Guide, a resource for practitioners and communities about what works, what is promising, and what does not work in juvenile justice, delinquency prevention, and child protection and safety. ASC is an international organization that promotes scientific and professional knowledge concerning the measurement, etiology, consequences, prevention, control, and treatment of crime and delinquency. This year’s meeting took place in San Francisco, CA.

OJJDP Invites Entries for the 2015 National Missing Children’s Day Poster Contest

OJJDP invites fifth grade students, their parents, educators, and their local communities to participate in the 2015 National Missing Children’s Day Poster Contest. This annual contest creates an opportunity for schools, law enforcement, and other child advocates to promote child safety by discussing the issue of missing and/or exploited children with youth, parents, and guardians.

OJJDP will invite the winning child and his or her teacher, parents, and state contest manager to attend the National Missing Children’s Day commemoration in May 2015, at which the student will receive an award for his or her winning artwork.

Please contact your state contest manager for your state’s submission deadline. Visit the poster contest page for additional information, including contest rules. For questions related to the awards process or poster contest, please contact the Missing and Exploited Children’s Program.

Registration Open for Web-Based Training on Engaging Families in the Justice System

OJJDP, in collaboration with the National Center for Youth in Custody, is offering "Engaging Families in the Justice System." This Web-based training highlights practices to help juvenile justice professionals build partnerships with families. Participants will learn how to:

• Describe meaningful family engagement based on recent research with families.
• Identify specific practices used nationwide to increase family engagement.
• Use the Campaign for Youth Justice’s FAMILY model, as well as other resources, to build partnerships with families.

Register for the training at OJJDP Online University.

Legal Sector Guide Available on Commercial Sexual Exploitation and Sex Trafficking

The Institute of Medicine and the National Research Council have released a guide to the report Confronting Commercial Sexual Exploitation and Sex Trafficking of Minors in the United States. This OJJDP-funded guide is designed for law enforcement professionals, attorneys, and judges who interact with victims, survivors, and perpetrators of commercial sexual exploitation and sex trafficking of minors. The guide includes key terms, risk factors and consequences, current practices, and recommendations. Learn more about OJJDP’s programs and resources addressing commercial sexual exploitation of children.

New Juvenile Court Statistics Released

The National Center for Juvenile Justice (NCJJ) has released Juvenile Court Statistics 2011. The report that draws on data from the OJJDP-sponsored National Juvenile Court Data Archive to profile more than 1.2 million delinquency cases and 116,000 petitioned status offense cases handled in 2011 by U.S. courts with juvenile jurisdiction. The report also tracks trends in delinquency cases between 1985 and 2011 and in status offense cases processed between 1995 and 2011. Funded by OJJDP, the archive collects automated juvenile court data from around the nation in order to inform juvenile justice research and policymaking decisions. The data used in this report were contributed to the archive by more than 2,400 courts with jurisdiction over 85 percent of the juvenile population in 2011.