No Place for Kids: The Case for Reducing Juvenile Incarceration

Reviews research on states' reliance on incarcerating juveniles in dangerous, ineffective, unnecessary, obsolete, wasteful, and inadequate facilities. Recommends ways to redesign corrections systems, including investing in non-residential alternatives

Maltreatment of Youth In U.S. Juvenile Corrections Facilities

In its 2011 report, "No Place for Kids: The Case for Reducing Juvenile Incarceration," the Annie E. Casey Foundation demonstrated that America's heavy reliance on juvenile incarceration is a failed strategy for addressing youth crime. Specifically, "No Place for Kids" showed that heavy reliance on correctional confinement exposes incarcerated youth to widespread maltreatment; results in alarming levels of recidivism; incarcerates children who do not pose significant threats to public safety; ignores the emergence of treatment models that produce better outcomes; wastes money with costs that often exceed $100,000 per young person per year; and fails to provide adequate mental health, educational, substance abuse and other services. This report focuses on the first of these challenges, the widespread and persistent maltreatment of youth confined in America's juvenile corrections facilities. These facilities often go by euphemistic labels such as training school, reformatory, correctional center, etc., but are in essence youth prisons

The Bifurcated Age-Metallicity Relation of Milky Way Globular Clusters and its Implications For the Accretion History of the Galaxy

We use recently derived ages for 61 Milky Way (MW) globular clusters (GCs) to show that their age-metallicity relation (AMR) can be divided into two distinct, parallel sequences at [Fe/H] \ga -1.8. Approximately one-third of the clusters form an offset sequence that spans the full range in age ($\sim 10.5$--13 Gyr), but is more metal rich at a given age by $\sim 0.6$ dex in [Fe/H]. All but one of the clusters in the offset sequence show orbital properties that are consistent with membership in the MW disk. They are not simply the most metal-rich GCs, which have long been known to have disk-like kinematics, but they are the most metal-rich clusters at all ages. The slope of the mass-metallicity relation (MMR) for galaxies implies that the offset in metallicity of the two branches of the AMR corresponds to a mass decrement of 2 dex, suggesting host galaxy masses of M_{*} \sim 10^{7-8} \msol for GCs that belong to the more metal-poor AMR. We suggest that the metal-rich branch of the AMR consists of clusters that formed in-situ in the disk, while the metal-poor GCs were formed in relatively low-mass (dwarf) galaxies and later accreted by the MW. The observed AMR of MW disk stars, and of the LMC, SMC and WLM dwarf galaxies are shown to be consistent with this interpretation, and the relative distribution of implied progenitor masses for the halo GC clusters is in excellent agreement with the MW subhalo mass function predicted by simulations. A notable implication of the bifurcated AMR, is that the identical mean ages and spread in ages, for the metal rich and metal poor GCs are difficult to reconcile with an in-situ formation for the latter population.Comment: 16 pages, 9 figures, accepted for publication in MNRA

The Age, Metallicity and Alpha-Element Abundance of Galactic Globular Clusters from Single Stellar Population Models

Establishing the reliability with which stellar population parameters can be measured is vital to extragalactic astronomy. Galactic GCs provide an excellent medium in which to test the consistency of Single Stellar Population (SSP) models as they should be our best analogue to a homogeneous (single) stellar population. Here we present age, metallicity and $\alpha$-element abundance measurements for 48 Galactic globular clusters (GCs) as determined from integrated spectra using Lick indices and SSP models from Thomas, Maraston & Korn, Lee & Worthey and Vazdekis et al. By comparing our new measurements to independent determinations we are able to assess the ability of these SSPs to derive consistent results -- a key requirement before application to heterogeneous stellar populations like galaxies. We find that metallicity determinations are extremely robust, showing good agreement for all models examined here, including a range of enhancement methods. Ages and $\alpha$-element abundances are accurate for a subset of our models, with the caveat that the range of these parameters in Galactic GCs is limited. We are able to show that the application of published Lick index response functions to models with fixed abundance ratios allows us to measure reasonable $\alpha$-element abundances from a variety of models. We also examine the age-metallicity and [$\alpha$/Fe]-metallicity relations predicted by SSP models, and characterise the possible effects of varied model horizontal branch morphology on our overall results.Comment: 22 pages, 19 figures, accepted for publication in MNRA

Two Decades of JDAI: From Demonstration Project to National Standard

Provides an overview of Casey's Juvenile Detention Alternatives Initiative to reduce pre-trial detentions of youth. Reports on nationwide implementation, achievements in detention reform and in broader juvenile justice reforms, and remaining challenges

Pathways to Juvenile Detention Reform: Beyond Detention

Documents the ways in which detention reforms in general -- and the Juvenile Detention Alternatives Initiative's comprehensive reform model in particular -- stimulate and support an array of other juvenile justice system improvements

Pathways to Juvenile Detention Reform: Detention Reform in Rural Jurisdictions: Challenges and Opportunities

Discusses considerations for replicating Casey's Juvenile Detention Alternatives Initiative in rural areas -- geographic, economic, and social factors and their effects on the juvenile justice system's budgets and functions. Includes case studies

Juvenile Detention Alternatives Initiative Progress Report 2014

This reports finds that The Juvenile Detention Alternatives Initiative (JDAI) model has proliferated with increasing speed since 2009 and now reaches over one-fourth of the total U.S. youth population. At the end of 2013, JDAI was operating in more than 250 counties nationwide, spread across 39 states and the District of Columbia. These jurisdictions are home to just under 10 million youth ages 10 -- 17, 29 percent of the U.S. youth population. More than 10 million additional youth reside in states that have signed on as JDAI partners and have committed themselves to supporting local JDAI replication efforts. Through JDAI, participating jurisdictions are sharply reducing reliance on detention. The most recent data available show that among local JDAI sites, which reported both current and pre-JDAI data, the total average daily detention population was 43 percent lower in 2011 than in the year before joining JDAI. Thirty-four percent of these reporting sites have reduced their average daily detention populations by more than half since entering JDAI. Also, the data show that participating jurisdictions admitted 59,000 fewer youth to detention in 2012 than in the year prior to launching JDAI, a drop of 39 percent. While detention use has been declining nationwide, detention populations are falling far faster in JDAI sites than in non-JDAI jurisdictions. Data from the federal Census of Juveniles in Residential Placement show that after rising rapidly throughout the 1990s and then holding steady through 2006, the total number of youth detained nationwide fell 22 percent from 2006 to 2010. However, a detailed statistical analysis completed in 2012 by researchers at the University of California Berkeley Law School found that detention populations have fallen far more in participating JDAI sites (42 percent) than the statewide averages(17 percent)