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Supporting LGBTQ Youth

Supporting LGBTQ Youth

The Supporting the Well-Being of System-Involved LGBTQ Youth Certificate Program is designed to help juvenile justice, child welfare, and other system partners target and improve outcomes for at-risk LGBTQ youth. The program will focus on the particular challenges faced by LGBTQ youth in child-serving systems (including juvenile justice, child welfare, education and behavioral health) as well as strengths and protective factors common to the population, and will highlight effective policy and practice reforms that promote positive youth development and take a holistic approach to addressing their needs.

Participants will receive instruction from national experts on the terms and concepts related to sexual orientation, gender identity and expression (SOGIE), and how to shape organizational cultures and approaches to support the safety and well-being of LGBTQ youth. This includes guidance on how to develop effective policies, training, and data evaluation efforts; better identify and effectively engage LGBTQ youth and their families; build community capacity to serve this population; and develop comprehensive and multi-faceted strategies and supports that promote positive youth development. Specific attention will be paid to the prevalence of multi-system involvement and compounding issues of implicit bias and stigma, racial and ethnic disparities, homelessness and commercial sexual exploitation of LGBTQ youth.

Upon completion of the Certificate Program and submission of an approved Capstone Project, participants will receive an Executive Certificate from Georgetown University, membership into CJJR’s Fellows Network, and ongoing support from the CJJR staff.

This year, CJJR has partnered with the National Center for Lesbian Rights and Ceres Policy Research to offer the Supporting LGBTQ Youth Certificate Program.

Capstone Project
Tuition & Application
Application Guidelines 
Curriculum & Instructors
What our participants are saying

Capstone Project

As part of the Certificate Program, participants are required to develop and implement a Capstone Project during the twelve-month period following the completion of their Certificate Program session. The Capstone Project is a set of actions each individual participant or team will design and undertake within their organization and/or community by applying their learning from the Certificate Program to initiate or continue collaborative efforts related to improving outcomes for system-involved LGBTQ youth. Learn more about Capstone Projects.

Tuition & Application

The last Certificate Program was held October 22-26, 2018.  The application period is now closed. Please check back in 2019 for future program dates.

Tuition subsidies are available through CJJR’s Janet Reno Scholarships and the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention’s Center for Coordinated Assistance to States. These competitive scholarships of up to $1,000 per person will be provided to teams that show a heightened readiness to utilize the curriculum to undertake changes in their local community, as determined by CJJR’s review of the individual and team applicants. There will also be a separate category of need-based subsidies available through CJJR to support the participation of individuals and teams with demonstrated need.  Read more about tuition.

Please direct any questions to jjreform@georgetown.edu.

Application Guidelines

The Supporting LGBTQ Youth Certificate Program is designed for public and private sector leaders working in the juvenile justice, child welfare, mental health, substance use, education, and other related systems of care that serve youth involved in, or at risk of becoming involved in the juvenile justice system. Those who attend the program will be current and future leaders – individuals who are responsible for, and capable of, effectuating change. Participants can be from the local or state level and may include individuals working on best practices for this population at the national level.

While individuals will be permitted, interested applicants are strongly encouraged to apply as a team to increase their ability to implement reform upon completion of the Certificate Program. Applicants are encouraged to form teams of no more than eight people. Ideally, teams will include the most senior juvenile justice professional in the jurisdiction and representatives from core partners, including behavioral health and child welfare agencies, schools and community-based organizations.

Strongly recommended team members include:

  • Juvenile justice agency director / most senior juvenile justice leader in the jurisdiction, and/or key juvenile justice management staff, such as Program Directors, Deputy Directors, facility management, etc.
  • Leaders from partner agencies including child welfare, behavioral health, education, and community organizations focused on this population of children and youth

Recommended team members include:

  • A judge or others from the court system
  • Treatment providers
  • Law enforcement
  • Probation/Parole Officer

The exact composition of the team will depend on the specific goals of the team. Selection decisions will focus heavily on participants’ readiness for implementing reforms, assessed by asking applicants to summarize their role in past reform efforts, especially efforts that engaged leaders in other systems, and their agency’s relationship with other child-serving agencies. Applicants should identify the barriers they have experienced in undertaking this work and what efforts they have taken to overcome those barriers. We are looking for participants who are seeking to build on their successes or overcome challenges, thereby being in a position to most benefit from the instruction and technical assistance they will receive during the Certificate Program and as Fellows. The strength of team composition will also be considered within the context of the goals of the team.

This program is NOT accepting applications from students who do not also hold a professional role in a child serving organization.


Curriculum & Instructors

The 2018 curriculum includes the following modules:

Module 1: LGBTQ/SOGIE 101 and Positive Youth Development

  • Understanding SOGIE Terminology and Concepts: This module will provide foundational information to set the stage for the rest of the curriculum, including guiding principles, SOGIE terminology and concepts, risk and protective factors for LGBTQ youth, research on LGBTQ youth in the JJ system and other systems of care, and how to collect SOGIE data to drive reforms.

Module 2: Applying an Intersectional Lens

  • Treating LGBTQ Youth as Whole People: Understanding that the majority—85%–of LGBTQ youth in the justice system are of color, justice professionals are building relationships with youth who have multiple identities. These youth are also navigating multiple forms of oppression. This unit introduces the concept of intersectionality and provides suggestions for serving LGBTQ youth of color in a way that maximizes their well-being.

Module 3: Youth and Community Engagement

  • Youth Panel: Perhaps the most important voice to be heard in a program of this nature is from the youth themselves. This session will consist of a panel of LGBTQ youth, who will share their lived experience and provide insight into how the caseworkers and systems they encountered best supported or failed to support them in their journey. Their input at this early stage of the program will provide context for the entire curriculum.
  • Developing a Continuum of Community Based Services: Establishing a community-based continuum of care can prevent LGBTQ youth from unnecessary penetration into the juvenile justice system, and collaborating with community-based organizations as partners is crucial to holding youth accountable while also providing needed services. This module will teach participants about developing and/or identifying a continuum of community-based services for LGBTQ youth. These approaches may support efforts to divert youth from system involvement, strengthen connections to pro-social supports, and promote successful community re-entry.

Module 4: Multi-System Experiences: Holistic Approaches to Serving LGBTQ Youth

This module will provide instruction around the issues LGBTQ youth confront in the juvenile justice, child welfare and other child serving systems, and related policy and practice implications. The module will have an overarching focus on promoting health and well-being, understanding risk and protective factors and utilizing a framework of positive youth development. Specific sections will include:

  • LGBTQ Youth in the Juvenile Justice System
  • Homelessness and Runaway Youth
  • Child Welfare/Crossover Youth
  • Multi-Disciplinary Panel (Immigration, School Climate, Disabilities)

Module 5: Gender Identity and Expression

  • History, Data, Policies and Protections for Trans Youth: Explore history and data on gender nonconforming and transgender youth in the juvenile justice system and policies and practices to protect and affirm transgender youth.
  • Health Care and Behavioral Health: Understand gender identity and expression as unique from sexual orientation and how systems can utilize positive, strengths-based approaches to navigate individual youths’ needs and identities.

Module 6: Family Engagement

  • Family Support Strategies and Interventions: This module will provide an in-depth look at how to engage the families of LGBTQ youth as partners, particularly where there is stigma or lack of support due to a youth’s sexual identity or orientation. The session will include interventions to increase family acceptance of LGBTQ youth and family finding, and will focus on how to embed family-focused and strength-based approaches into agency policy and practice and ensure family is defined broadly and provided meaningful opportunity to be involved in planning and care for the youth.

Module 7: Leading System Change 

  • Achieving Comprehensive, Agency-Wide Policy and Practice Change: This module will pair a juvenile justice leader with the subject matter expert who helped develop their LGBTQ policy. Guidance will be provided around establishing clear policy language, as well as staff training and buy-in, implementation, and overcoming resistance.

2018 Core Program Instructors:

  • Currey Cook, JD, Counsel and Director, Youth In Out-of-Home-Care Project, Lambda Legal
  • Angela Irvine, Ph.D., Vice President and Director, Community Programs, Impact Justice
  • Meghan Maury, JD, Policy Director, National LGBTQ Task Force
  • Becca Mui, M.Ed., Education Manager, GLSEN
  • Aydin Olson-Kennedy, LCSW, Executive Director, Los Angeles Gender Center
  • Johanna Olson-Kennedy, MD, Pediatrician, Division of Adolescent Medicine and Medical Director, Center for Transyouth Health and Development, Children’s Hospital Los Angeles
  • Carolyn Reyes, JD, MSW, Youth Policy Counsel, National Center for Lesbian Rights
  • Ryan Shanahan, Ph.D., Research Director, Center on Youth Justice, Vera Institute of Justice
  • Jason Szanyi, JD, Deputy Director, Center for Children’s Law and Policy
  • Harper Jean Tobin, JD, MSSA, Director of Policy, National Center for Transgender Equality
  • Shannan Wilber, JD, Youth Policy Director, National Center for Lesbian Rights

What our participants are saying

The Certificate Program provided our state with an unparalleled opportunity to address issues impacting a very vulnerable population of youth, through the provision of informative training modules that challenged us as individuals and in our professional roles. As a stakeholder group of representatives from youth and family serving agencies, we were engaged in an open environment to learn from experts, LGBTQ youth themselves, as well as an array of professional allies. It was a rare opportunity to be brought together in this manner, to learn and reflect on the needs of our promising youth, and to develop collaborative strategies to help Arizona evolve an affirming, respectful response to the needs of LGBTQ youth and their families.

Arizona Team | Class of 2017

 

Attending the Certificate Program provided us with increased knowledge and awareness of the myriad of issues facing system involved LGBTQ youth as well as provided us with the information needed to better support these youth. The connections that we formed through this experience have enabled us to enhance our Capstone Project, connect with peers across the country, and ultimately, have our Capstone Project become a state-wide initiative due to the connections formed, knowledge, tools and resources gained from attending this program.

Suffolk County, NY Team | Class of 2017

 

Our team from Washington State was fortunate to be able to participate in CJJR’s Supporting LGBTQ Youth Certificate Program. The week was an amazing learning experience due to the quality of speakers and overall engaging, positive atmosphere. We were provided thought provoking exercises, as well as concrete steps to understand and better help our system involved LGBTQ youth. The ancillary learning that occurs from jurisdictions around the country greatly enhances the experience and provides valuable contacts for future efforts. We highly recommend any team or individual take the opportunity to participate.

Washington State Team | Class of 2017

Read more testimonials.