Department of Special Education and Communication Disorders
Department of Special Education and Communication Disorders: Faculty Publications
Document Type
Learning Object
Date of this Version
12-2013
Citation
Strategy brief
Building and Sustaining Student Engagement series (December 2013)
Barkley Center, University of Nebraska-Lincoln, Lincoln, Nebraska, United States
Abstract
Conclusion
Youth courts represent a promising approach to developing youth involvement in diminishing juvenile delinquency and substance abuse, and as such, represent a useful approach to crime and violence prevention. As with conflict resolution education and peer mediation programs, the potential benefit of youth courts is two-fold. First, it has the possibility of diminishing youth crime and recidivism directly through the sanctions imposed and restorative practices used. Secondly, it may affect a wider group of teens through the skills, training and experiences of the youth volunteers. Based on the evaluation data to date, the youth court program appears to be a promising alternative for youth justice, and may have applications in the school setting, but there has been insufficient research to be able to draw strong conclusions about their impact.