The Center for Families, Children and the Courts Student Fellows Program: A Unique Experience to Develop Lawyers as Problem Solvers

The Center for Families, Children and the Courts Student Fellows Program I (SFP) is now underway. The course provides students with a unique perspective on the law, instructing them on policies and theories that underlie family justice system reform. The SFP includes classroom discussion, lectures, and guest speakers about cutting edge issues in family law,…

Celebrating Success with the Truancy Court Program

Proud TCP Graduate Aaliyah Grimes poses with Mrs. O’Malley (Photo by Tom Nappi). To view more photos from the event, click here or here.  “This has always been my dream,” remarked Aaliyah Grimes, a third grade student at Margaret Brent Elementary/Middle School in Baltimore City. Aaliyah, a 2012 graduate of the Center for Families, Children…

Juvenile Justice Reform: CFCC’s Urban Child Symposium, The Beginning or the End? The Urban Child’s Experience in the Juvenile Justice System

Professor Bernardine Dohrn opened CFCC’s fourth annual Urban Child Symposium with a powerful presentation on the Supreme Court’s recent consideration of juvenile justice cases.    Over 200 people attended “The Beginning or the End? The Urban Child’s Experience in the Juvenile Justice System,” which included interdisciplinary panel discussions of issues such as the psychological, social, and…

ALL FAMILIES COUNT

By Lisa Polyak One of the most essential tools in the making of law or regulation is the tool of enumeration. It seems obvious that in order to define whether a population suffers from a condition that can be remedied by a change of public policy – we need to quantify the number of people…

The Pirates of Pelican Point

By Joan Weber On January 13th, students at Violetville Elementary-Middle school who participated in the Truancy Court Program’s Kids & Theater program presented a morning of theater to their families, fellow students and staff at the school. The actors were dressed in their purple for Violetville’s “Purple Friday”. The production included a staged reading of…

Reporting Child Abuse and Neglect: What Does the “Penn State Scandal” Tell Us About Our Laws and Values?

CFCC’s Director is a graduate of the Pennsylvania State University. Joe Paterno was her graduation speaker. That said, like the rest of the country, all of us at CFCC are horrified as we watch more and more shocking details come out in charges of sexual abuse committed by former Penn State assistant football coach Jerry…

Domestic Violence and The Criminal Justice System: Part of the Problem, Part of the Solution, or Both?

We recently posted on CFCC’s Facebook page about a Topeka, Kansas, City Council’s decision to decriminalize domestic violence under city law. Although the state of Kansas still has a domestic violence law on the books, police and prosecutors had stopped enforcing the law for budgetary reasons, except for felony domestic violence cases. In a Baltimore…