Providing Mental Health Training to State Juvenile Justice Systems

OJJDP's Demonstration Programs Continuation Grants program was established to provide grants and cooperative agreements to organizations that OJJDP has selected for funds in prior years. This program will be authorized by an Act appropriating funds for the Department of Justice.

The majority of youth in contact with the juvenile justice system experience mental health disorders, with some youth significantly impaired. Many of the juvenile justice staff supervising these youth in juvenile detention and correctional facilities have received little formal adolescent mental health training and lack the skills necessary to effectively respond to these youth. A new specialized training curriculum- the Mental Health Training Curriculum for Juvenile Justice (MHTC-JJ)- developed and tested by the Models for Change Mental Health/Juvenile Justice Action Network through support from the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, was created to address this need. The MHTC-JJ is an eight hour training focused on adolescent development, mental health disorders and treatment, the important role of families, and practical strategies for engaging and interacting with youth. The National Center for Mental Health and Juvenile Justice (NCMHJJ) is seeking a second year of funding from the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention (OJJDP) to train juvenile correctional and detention trainers in 10 competitively selected sites on the MHTC-JJ. A train the trainer approach will be used and the NCMHJJ will evaluate these sessions to examine whether the Train the Trainer sessions successfully prepared trainers to administer the MHTC-JJ. In addition, the NCMHJJ will evaluate the MHTC-JJ trainings provided by the trained trainers in the selected sites to determine if the training improved staff responses to youth.
CA/NCF