Youth Initiatives

youth initiatives
We invest in young people as leaders within their communities and beyond and support them to reach their self-defined goals.

The Center for Justice Innovation works with youth to create paths to economic mobility, build community safety, and address the inequities and racist policies in the criminal legal system that have disproportionately harmed and criminalized BIPOC youth.  

Transformative relationships among staff, young people, and the community are the foundation of the Center’s model. We invest in young people as leaders within their communities and beyond and support them to reach their self-defined goals.

Initiatives

  • Youth Impact

    Youth can be transformative leaders, addressing inequity in their communities and the factors that lead to youth involvement in the criminal legal system.  

  • Identity-Based Initiatives

    We provide affirming space for young people to explore their identities, build community, pursue self-care, and access healing spaces with an intersectional lens. 

  • Youth Entrepreneurship and Social Enterprise

    Social enterprise and entrepreneurship programs nurture young people’s skills to develop career pipelines and start businesses, solve local problems, and support economic development. 

  • Youth-led Placemaking

    Youth-led placemaking forges strong connections between individuals and their environments to create public spaces that foster community well-being. 

  • Youth Arts

    Art engages young people to build creativity, skills, and create networking opportunities to support educational and career trajectories. 

  • Youth Action Institute

    The Youth Action Institute is a public policy research fellowship that supports young New Yorkers in investigating and testing solutions to the issues and policies that affect their lives

  • Young Parent Initiative

    Young Parent Initiative is a new pilot project of the Center to address the needs of young parents so that they can provide social and economic supports for their young children.

Publications & Digital Media

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News

  • What kind of programming would proposed Staten Island community justice center have?

    December 11, 2024
    Staten Island Advance

    Staten Island’s first-ever community justice center is set to open on the grounds of a former courthouse, bringing an innovative model that the Center for Justice Innovation has implemented across the city to a new borough. Each community justice center reflects the unique needs of the community. The new justice center in Staten Island would provide services and positive activities for youth, people involved in the justice system, and the borough as a whole. Senior Director of Court Reform Kelly Mulligan shares details on what’s in store at the upcoming community justice center.

  • We Don’t Have to Choose Between Safety and Justice

    For far too long, we’ve been told that we must choose between justice and safety, that those two goals are in direct competition. Community Justice challenges that false dichotomy, providing a path forward in divided times.

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