School Pathways to the Juvenile Justice System The Context for a Practice Guide for Courts and Schools

The NCJFCJ has published a Technical Assistance Bulletin on the School Pathways to the Juvenile Justice System: A Context for a Practice Guide for Courts and Schools as part of a larger project addressing school discipline referrals to the juvenile justice system. The project aims to reduce the number of referrals to the juvenile justice system for school based behaviors through the establishment and collaboration of judicially led court/school partnerships. The bulletin was published to provide a context for courts and schools regarding the need to reduce the number of referrals to the courts, along with a history and impact of zero tolerance policies. The bulletin serves as introduction to the issue of school discipline referrals to the justice system, while the soon to be released Practice Guide explains the process to be used by judicially led court/school partnerships to reduce the number of referrals.