Posted on July 19, 2017
@CyndieRice is on The Hill, meeting w Congressman Albio Sires, a true champion for NJ children. Great discussion on #healthcare, #childcare and #preschool.
Posted by Advocates for Children of New Jersey on Wednesday, July 19, 2017
Posted on July 10, 2017
Advocates for Children of New Jersey (ACNJ) released its annual Kids Count county profiles and pocket guide today, comparing the state’s 21 counties across 12 measures of child well-being and providing 5-year child trend data at the state and county level. This year, instead of giving an overall rank for each county, ACNJ took a different approach, comparing counties across four domains: child and family economics, child health, safety and well-being, and education. Read more…
Posted on June 27, 2017
On June 26th, all 40 of New Jersey’s State Senators voted unanimously in favor of S447, the Chronic Absenteeism Bill!
With 147,000 or 10.5 percent of the state’s PreK-12th graders identified as chronically absent in the 2015-2016 school year, this bill is a strong first-step in improving school attendance. The bill ensures that every district is using the same definition when measuring student absences and requires that all School Report Cards include data on chronic absenteeism so that the public can be apprised of whether schools in their communities are struggling with too many students missing too much school.
Lastly, the bill moves from just reporting data to ensuring action by requiring schools with 10 percent or more of their students identified as being chronically absent to develop a chronic absenteeism plan, which must include parent input. S447 recognizes, in a non-punitive way, that even schools that are struggling with high absentee rates can make a difference in turning the tide on those rates with a clear plan and a concerted effort.
Thanks to Senator Diane Allen’s (R-7) leadership in sponsoring the bill and shepherding it through the Senate, it is now headed to the Assembly Education Committee for hearings.
Posted on June 19, 2017
Late last week, legislative leaders Senate President Steve Sweeney and Assembly Speaker Vincent Prieto announced a deal that would add $125 
million in state aid for public education to the proposed state budget which includes $25 million for preschool expansion!
This is a long overdue step in putting young children first by providing more 3- and 4-year olds with a strong educational foundation for kindergarten and beyond.
But it’s not a done deal…….
The next step is for both the Senate and Assembly to vote on this budget. It is critical that your state legislators hear that YOU support the $25 million included in the budget to expand preschool.
Voice your support:
Send a message to your state senator and BOTH Assembly members today.
If you have another minute, please thank Senate President Sweeney and Speaker Prieto for including funding preschool expansion in the proposed budget.
They can be reached at by email or phone at:
| Senate President Sweeney | SenSweeney@njleg.org | (856) 251-9801/(856) 339-0808 (call either office) |
| Assembly Speaker Prieto | AsmPrieto@njleg.org | (201) 770-1303 |
Sample script:
Hello, my name is (your name) and I’m from (your town). I’m calling to express my thanks and support for the $25 million in preschool expansion funds added to the proposed state budget. Their leadership demonstrates a strong commitment to providing more children with quality early learning, giving kids the skills necessary to be successful in school and in life.
If you have any questions, please contact Cynthia Rice at 973-643-3876 or at crice@acnj.org.
Posted on June 13, 2017
On June 28, 1867, New Jersey’s largest youth prison, the New Jersey Training School for Boys, also known as Jamesburg, opened. And exactly 150 years later, on June 28, 2017, ACNJ, as member of the Youth Justice New Jersey Coalition, will rally to say, “150 years is enough.”
Join us at this important event.
It is time to close Jamesburg and reinvest those funds into a community-based system of care. Members of the Youth Justice New Jersey Coalition are urging New Jersey officials to fundamentally reimagine the state’s youth justice system. Priorities include:
The research supports this change. A new report, The Future of Youth Justice: A Community-Based Alternative to the Youth Prison Model, documents how conclusively youth prisons have failed at both protecting the community and turning young lives around. The report makes the case for states and localities to adopt a different approach, one that protects public safety and focuses on what works.
The youth prison model should be replaced with a continuum of community-based programs. For those young people who may need to be placed in secure confinement, the environment should reflect “smaller homelike facilities that prioritize age-appropriate rehabilitation.” The report features several states that have moved in this direction, demonstrating that community-based approaches can reduce recidivism, control costs and promote public safety.
One of the authors of this report, Patrick McCarthy, is president and chief executive officer of the Annie E. Casey Foundation. The other authors – Miriam Shark, a former associate director at the Foundation, and Vincent Schiraldi, a senior fellow at the Harvard Kennedy School, both were once youth correctional administrators.
The Annie E. Casey Foundation published a ground-breaking study in 2011, No Place for Kids: The Case for Reducing Reliance on Juvenile Incarceration, which showed that America’s overreliance on youth incarceration is dangerous, ineffective, obsolete, wasteful and unnecessary, while providing no net benefit to public safety. The Foundation updated those findings four years later in Maltreatment of Youth in U.S. Juvenile Corrections Facilities.
Over the last decade, developments in adolescent brain science and psychology have shown what common sense already suggested – that there are fundamental differences between the brains of teenagers and adults. Teen brains are not yet fully developed, making them more likely to engage in risky and impulsive behavior without weighing the consequences and succumbing to peer pressure.
Brain science research is appropriately influencing laws, policies and practices concerning youth who come into contact with law enforcement. Although teens should be held accountable for their actions, the goal of the juvenile justice system is for young offenders to return to their communities equipped with the skills they need to stay out of trouble and mature into productive adults.
To that end, in August 2015, the NJ Legislature and Governor Christie made significant reforms to our juvenile justice system. These smart reforms limited the use of solitary confinement in juvenile facilities, revamped the state law that allowed juveniles to be tried as adults in criminal court, added protections to ensure the safety of juveniles transferred to adult facilities, and required the collection of much needed data. As a member of the Youth Justice New Jersey Coalition, ACNJ worked with sponsors of the legislation to ensure that the reforms helped New Jersey youth. This coalition is continuing its work to reform other aspects of the juvenile justice system.
The research clearly indicates that a system focused on rehabilitation and prevention yields far better results. New Jersey is a national model in the Juvenile Detention Alternatives Initiative (JDAI), a national project led by the Annie E. Casey Foundation, which is focused on reducing the number of youth confined in county detention facilities. JDAI has resulted in far fewer youth being incarcerated in longer-term Juvenile Justice Commission facilities without risk to public safety. For more information about the results of JDAI in New Jersey, read ACNJ’s Special Kids Count Report: Juvenile Justice. But extreme racial inequalities persist within the New Jersey juvenile justice system that must be addressed. A new report, Bring our Children Home: Ain’t I A Child, released by the New Jersey Institute for Social Justice, found that while black and white youth engage in similar offenses at about the same rates overall, New Jersey’s black youth are disproportionately incarcerated. While progress has been made, more work is needed.
For more information, please contact Mary Coogan at ACNJ, mcoogan@acnj.org
