Agencies and organizations serving youth known to multiple systems of care--such as the child welfare, juvenile justice, mental health, and education systems--face significant challenges. No one system has all the critical information to best serve an individual child. Yet agencies often work in isolation, resulting in a lack of communication and coordination that is necessary to identify and implement appropriate service interventions for these youth. Moreover, when systems do not share information on an aggregate level, they are hampered in their ability to develop more effective programs and policies through data and information collection and analysis. As a result, youth often receive inadequate, inappropriate, duplicative or contradictory services and communities frequently do not have a comprehensive understanding of their impact on their most vulnerable populations. This is both inefficient and ineffective.

The Information Sharing Certificate Program is designed to enable leaders to overcome information sharing challenges, while respecting laws and other provisions that protect the privacy and other rights of youth and their families. The program is conducted by the Center for Juvenile Justice Reform (CJJR) at Georgetown University's Public Policy Institute, in partnership with the Juvenile Law Center (JLC), and is supported by funding from the MacArthur Foundation's Models for Change: Systems Reform in Juvenile Justice Initiative. The program provides a venue through which leaders can increase their knowledge about information sharing, develop action plans (Capstone Projects) for reform, and receive technical assistance to break through barriers they encounter when implementing the reforms. This program is designed as a complement to CJJR's other Certificate Programs that focus on the need for child welfare, juvenile justice and other child serving systems to work together to improve outcomes for youth known to the child welfare and juvenile justice systems--youth commonly referred to as "crossover youth."

Please see the links to the right for more information about the Information Sharing Certificate Program, including how to apply.