OJJDP has long supported the development of early intervention and delinquency prevention programs. Early, aggressive intervention reduces delinquency before it starts, preventing juveniles from entering the juvenile justice system and lowering the number of serious, violent, and chronic juvenile offenders. These interventions create opportunities for positive youth development and allow juveniles at high risk of delinquency to participate in activities designed to reduce the likelihood of subsequent juvenile offending.

The early intervention and prevention programs supported by OJJDP range from longitudinal studies to mentoring programs to truancy reduction efforts. OJJDP also recognizes the importance of coordinated efforts to prevent delinquency and provide early intervention, as shown by its work with other Federal agencies on initiatives such as Safe Schools/Healthy Students, a collaborative effort of the U.S. Departments of Education, Health and Human Services, and Justice. The research, prevention, and early intervention programs described in this chapter reflect OJJDP’s strong commitment to combating juvenile violence and delinquency and intervening early and effectively—before delinquency becomes a pattern of behavior and juveniles find themselves on a path to chronic delinquency.

Causes and Correlates of Delinquency

Since 1986, OJJDP has sponsored three major longitudinal studies—collectively known as the Program of Research on the Causes and Correlates of Delinquency—that examine how juveniles develop within the context of family, school, peers, and community. Researchers are studying samples of inner-city youth in Denver, CO; Pittsburgh, PA; and Rochester, NY. Findings from the research are providing valuable information about the causes of delinquency. Many of the program’s findings confirm earlier beliefs and knowledge about the roots of delinquency and violence—for example, that maltreatment in childhood is associated with later behavioral problems and that less serious problem behaviors precede more serious delinquency. Since 1986, OJJDP has published Bulletins on risk factors, such as family disruption, child maltreatment, and gang involvement, that can lead to delinquency. Recent OJJDP releases continue to explore these themes.

As part of the Causes and Correlates Program, in July 2001 OJJDP released the Bulletin Gun Use by Male Juveniles: Research and Prevention (NCJ 188992), which describes a study on patterns of juvenile gun ownership and use. The Bulletin included findings drawn from the Rochester Youth Development Study, which tracked the growth of delinquent behavior, drug use, and related behaviors in a sample of 1,000 adolescents who have been interviewed in 12 waves since 1987. During the survey period, participating adolescents were asked whether they owned a gun and, if they did, their motivation for doing so. The findings from this study, combined with those from previous research, suggest that to reduce illegal gun carrying and firearm violence, law enforcement agencies and communities must work together to build trust and cooperation. Specifically, the research indicates that rates of violent crime are lower in urban communities where police and residents have a high level of mutual trust and where residents in high-crime neighborhoods are willing to intervene on behalf of the common good. Research also shows that illegal firearm use by juveniles is a relatively small and localized problem and that gun carrying among juveniles tends to be transitory. Such findings suggest that illegal gun carrying by juveniles can be deterred by focusing interventions on “hot spots” of gun problems.

In August 2001, OJJDP released another Bulletin based on research from Causes and Correlates sites, Juvenile Delinquency and Serious Injury Victimization (NCJ 188676). Using data from Denver and Pittsburgh, researchers examined the prevalence of serious injury victimization in the general population, factors associated with becoming a victim who sustains a serious injury, and risk factors or combinations of risk factors that most accurately predict victimization involving serious injury. The Bulletin focuses on victims of assaults and robberies who sustained serious injuries as a result of the victimization. The research shows that a sizable percentage of youth and young adult males and females are victimized. In Pittsburgh, 11 percent of males between the ages of 16.5 and 18.5 reported suffering a serious injury during an assault or robbery. In Denver, 20 percent of males and 10 percent of females ages 13 to 17 reported being seriously hurt during an assault or robbery. At both sites, minorities, especially African American males, were more likely to have been victims. Risk factors for victimization included participating in gang or group fights, carrying a weapon, committing a serious assault, selling drugs, and associating with delinquent peers. Although not all victims had these risk factors, the majority of victims (66 percent in Pittsburgh and 87 percent of males and 72 percent of females in Denver) were involved in behaviors or activities that might be associated with sustaining serious injuries. Because most victims are involved in assaultive behaviors, sell drugs, and/or have delinquent peers, avoidance of these risky behaviors could result in the lowering of risk for victimization.

For more information on the Causes and Correlates Program and a complete list of publications resulting from this research, visit the Causes and Correlates site (ojjdp.ncjrs.org/ccd/index.html), accessible from the “Programs” page of the OJJDP Web site.

Coordinating Council

The Coordinating Council on Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention (Council) is an independent body within the Executive branch of the Federal Government. Its primary functions are to identify and develop policies, objectives, and priorities for Federal programs and activities relating to juvenile delinquency, juvenile victimization, and missing and exploited children. The Council also examines how programs can be better coordinated at different levels of government to serve at-risk youth, makes recommendations to the President and Congress, and reviews the programs and practices of Federal agencies to assess their compliance with the Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention Act. The Attorney General chairs the Council, and the Administrator of OJJDP serves as its vice chair. The Council also includes the Secretaries of the U.S. Departments of Education, Health and Human Services, Housing and Urban Development, and Labor; the Director of the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy; the Commissioner of the Immigration and Naturalization Service; and the Chief Executive Officer of the Corporation for National and Community Service, in addition to nine practitioner members appointed by the President, the Senate majority leader, and the Speaker of the House.

During fiscal year (FY) 2001, the Council focused on reducing childhood exposure to violence and protecting children online. The Council’s March 2001 quarterly meeting, for example, was devoted to a discussion of how to better protect children from violence, improve the prosecution of child abuse cases, and stem the growing number of online child predators. The Council also addressed the need to prevent and eliminate youth gangs and met to discuss the coordination of faith- and community-based organizations and initiatives.

As part of a Federal interagency collaboration to prevent youth crime, the Deputy Attorney General led a discussion on preventing and controlling juvenile gang crime at the Council’s July 2001 meeting. The meeting’s discussion centered on research, training, and programs to combat youth gangs; a survey of tribal youth gangs; and the difficulty of defining what constitutes a “youth gang.”

During 2001, the Council also continued to maintain and update two Web sites it launched in 2000. The Parenting Resources for the 21st Century Web site (parentingresources.ncjrs.org) links parents and others responsible for the care of children with information on issues covering the full spectrum of parenting—from caring for a newborn to finding information about college scholarships. The Children With Disabilities Web site (www.childrenwithdisabilities.ncjrs.org) addresses an array of developmental, physical, and emotional disabilities and offers families, service providers, and other interested individuals information on advocacy, education, employment, health, housing, recreation, technical assistance, and transportation.

For additional information on the Council’s activities and responsibilities, readers may request a copy of the OJJDP Fact Sheet Coordinating Council Promotes Federal Collaboration (FS–200021) from the Juvenile Justice Clearinghouse.

Drug-Free Communities Support Program

The Drug-Free Communities Support Program (DFCSP) provides grants to more than 450 community coalitions across the Nation and strengthens local efforts to prevent and reduce young people’s illegal use of drugs, alcohol, and tobacco. The White House Office of National Drug Control Policy (ONDCP) oversees the program, and OJJDP awards and administers DFCSP grants. Participating coalitions are made up of youth and parents; business and media representatives; school and law enforcement officials; youth services, religious, and other community organizations; and health professionals and government agencies with expertise in the field of substance abuse. Effective projects have included teen courts, alcohol and drug abstinence pledge programs, charter schools, peer mentoring programs, and prevention and outreach activities.

Now in its fourth year of funding, DFCSP added nearly $15 million in new grants to 157 sites in FY 2001. The program also includes technical assistance and evaluation components. In April 2001 (before funds were awarded), OJJDP and ONDCP sponsored a series of regional workshops to explain the application process to prospective applicants.

Detailed information on DFCSP, such as descriptions of program history and current activities, lists of grantees, funding updates, training and technical assistance opportunities, and additional resources, is available on the OJJDP Web site at ojjdp.ncjrs.org/dfcs/index.html. The Drug-Free Communities Support Program, a Fact Sheet released in April 2001 (FS–200108), presents a brief overview of DFCSP, and a related Fact Sheet released the same month, Promising Practices: Drug-Free Communities Support Program (FS–200111), highlights innovative antidrug strategies developed by community coalitions participating in the program. Both are available from the Juvenile Justice Clearinghouse.

Intergenerational Transmission of Antisocial Behavior

Researchers at the University at Albany, State University of New York, continue to examine the causes and consequences of antisocial behavior through the intergenerational component of the Rochester Youth Development Study (RYDS). The focal subjects of this intergenerational study are the oldest biological children of the original adolescent participants in RYDS (begun in 1986 with funding from OJJDP as part of the Program of Research on the Causes and Correlates of Delinquency). Through interviews and videotaped observations with the child, the parent (the original RYDS study participant as an adolescent), and the child’s other major caregiver, researchers can study continuity and discontinuity in antisocial behavior as well as the causes and consequences of these behaviors. Information about a wide range of topics (e.g., family, friends, neighborhood, school, beliefs, and behaviors) is collected in an effort to construct a picture of these children’s development that is as complete as possible. In addition, data are being collected from schools and social services and criminal justice agencies. Using these data in combination with the data collected from the original study of the Rochester participants and their parents allows researchers to examine the development of antisocial behavior in a high-risk sample across three generations.

Three years of data collection for this 5-year study are now complete. Data collection for the fourth year of the study has just begun, and more than 400 families are currently enrolled. Cooperation and retention rates are excellent. Most efforts have focused on creating developmentally specific measurement strategies (both interviews and observations), collecting data, and processing the data for use in analyses. Results have been presented at a number of professional conferences, and several manuscripts in progress will be submitted for publication in scientific journals. One paper focuses on whether parenting behaviors mediate the level of intergenerational continuity in antisocial behavior; another focuses on important antecedent factors in determining parenting styles. The results will contribute to the field’s understanding of the development of antisocial behavior and allow researchers, policymakers, and practitioners to make informed decisions about the development of appropriate intervention programs. OJJDP is funding the program under an interagency agreement with the National Institute of Mental Health.

Juvenile Mentoring Program

The Juvenile Mentoring Program (JUMP) supports one-to-one mentoring projects for youth at risk of failing in school, dropping out of school, or becoming involved in delinquent behavior, including gang activity and substance abuse. Through JUMP, more than 2,500 at-risk young people in 20 States and Puerto Rico receive one-to-one mentoring to help keep them in school and away from drugs and crime. Participating young people are drawn from first grade through high school. Participating mentors are recruited from a variety of sources. Many JUMP sites use law enforcement officers as mentors; others rely on college students, senior citizens, military personnel, business people, clergy members, doctors, lawyers, teachers, tribal leaders, and government employees to serve as volunteer mentors.

In January 2001, OJJDP awarded more than $5.8 million in grants to support mentoring programs in 28 sites, including Atlanta, GA; Detroit, MI; Jacksonville, FL; and Oakland, CA. OJJDP competitively selected the 28 sites from a pool of 534 applicants, with awards ranging from $190,000 to $210,000 for use over a 3-year grant period. Ten sites focus on minority youth, two target girls, and five projects are specifically designed for court-involved youth. The JUMP sites represent a crosssection of every region in the Nation: 8 are predominantly rural, 16 are urban, 2 include both rural and urban areas, 1 is suburban, and 1 is on an Indian reservation. All sites will participate in the continuing national evaluation of JUMP.

Some programs emphasize tutoring and academics, whereas others focus on vocational counseling and job skills. All sites are required to coordinate their activities with local schools. The varied mentoring programs selected for funding share three important goals: improved academic performance, reduced school dropout rates, and prevention of delinquent behavior.

Persons interested in serving as a mentor may call the National Mentoring Center at 800–547–6339 to receive a list of nearby JUMP sites and other mentoring programs that need volunteers. Additional information on JUMP is available on the JUMP Web site (ojjdp.ncjrs.org/jump/index.html).

SafeFutures

OJJDP has supported the SafeFutures: Partnerships To Reduce Youth Violence and Delinquency initiative since 1995. Each year, the six communities (four urban, one rural, and one tribal) awarded funding under the initiative have each received a demonstration grant of approximately $1.4 million to assist with existing efforts to reduce youth violence and delinquency. The SafeFutures grantees—Boston, MA; Contra Costa County, CA; Fort Belknap Indian Community, MT; Imperial County, CA; St. Louis, MO; and Seattle, WA, which were selected through a competitive solicitation process—were chosen based on their substantial progress toward community assessment and strategic planning to address delinquency.

SafeFutures emphasized the importance of providing a continuum of care at all developmental stages for delinquent youth and those at risk of becoming delinquent. Goals of the initiative included preventing and controlling violence and delinquency in selected communities, building communities’ capacity to institutionalize and sustain a continuum of services by expanding and diversifying funding sources, and determining the success of project implementation and outcomes. During FY 2001, SafeFutures sites made significant progress in the areas of systems improvements, innovations in services and sanctions, and sustainability.

Sites have put in place integrated systems of care that link juvenile justice, behavioral health, education, youth development, and other services to meet the needs of youth and their families. For example:

• Boston’s Day Reporting Center has brought together the services of parole and probation agencies, neighborhood and faith-based organizations, schools, and employment agencies for youth returning to the community from secure confinement.

• Contra Costa County’s Summit Center is a collaborative effort of the probation department, mental health agencies, the County Office of Education, and various community service providers.

• Contra Costa’s “core team” in West County formed a combined case management group of probation, law enforcement, and community agencies to provide integrated supervision and service plans for serious offenders.

• Imperial County’s Family Resources Center, located in a public high school, is a one-stop shop of social services, behavioral health, and probation services for a previously underserved community.

Seattle also has made systems change a priority activity through involvement in larger initiatives affecting youth and its own key programs. The Safe-Futures project in Seattle influenced the planning and decisionmaking process of local officials and encouraged closer examination of the continuum of care approach and alternatives to incarceration through its work on King County’s Juvenile Justice Operational Master Plan. This work, in turn, led to Reinvesting in Youth, a feasibility study to address juvenile justice and youth services in Seattle/King County funded by The Annie E. Casey Foundation and SafeFutures. Phase 2 of the study began in May 2001 and focuses on developing an implementation plan and funding strategy.

In FY 2001, the innovative approaches to services and sanctions of the SafeFuture sites effectively engaged hard-to-reach, underserved youth and families. For example:

• St. Louis strengthened street outreach to gang-involved youth through a team of neighborhood residents and a partnership with a neighborhood church.

• Seattle’s SafeFutures Youth Center involved Southeast Asian and East African immigrant youth in positive community activities.

• The Fort Belknap Tribal Walkers program brought together youth who had considered or attempted suicide, service providers, and faith leaders to educate the community, support youth, and coordinate community responses to suicides and suicide attempts.

• Contra Costa County’s gang intervention strategy provided youth with job readiness training, initial placements in subsidized jobs, and support to make the transition to nonsubsidized employment.

SafeFutures communities went beyond developing collaborative relationships to establish partnerships among public agencies that influenced the financing, organization, and delivery of services. The Imperial County Interagency Steering Committee, for example, permitted juvenile justice, behavioral health, education, and social services department heads to establish policy, plan programs, and blend funds across agencies and categories. Boston’s resident governance board similarly established standards and priorities for neighborhood services and guided the allocation of city resources.

In FY 2001, OJJDP also continued to fund a national evaluation of SafeFutures being conducted by The Urban Institute of Washington, DC, to determine the success of the initiative and to track lessons learned at each site. Since FY 1995, The Urban Institute has received semiannual data submissions from each of the six SafeFutures sites for the Client Indicator Data Base (CIDB). Submissions contain individual-level data on SafeFutures youth clients and their caregivers, including demographic information, indicators of risk and resiliency, service referrals and utilization data, and education and juvenile justice outcomes. The most recent CIDB submission, which covered January–July 2001 and contained data for more than 5,000 youth and their adult caregivers, revealed thousands of youth receiving services, many at high risk of delinquency or already involved in the justice system.

In November 2000, OJJDP published Comprehensive Responses to Youth At Risk: Interim Findings From the SafeFutures Initiative (NCJ 183841), which draws on information gathered through visits to each SafeFutures site during the first 3 years of the initiative, followup discussions with selected participants, and analyses of secondary documents. The publication is available from the Juvenile Justice Clearinghouse.

Safe Schools/Healthy Students Initiative

The Safe Schools/Healthy Students (SS/HS) Initiative is an unprecedented collaborative effort of the U.S. Departments of Education (ED), Health and Human Services (HHS), and Justice (DOJ) that began in 1999. The initiative helps students develop the skills they need to promote positive mental health, engage in prosocial behavior, and avoid violent behavior and drug use. Another goal of the initiative is to help grantees create an infrastructure that will institutionalize and sustain the services developed.

Research shows that violence prevention efforts that build on children’s strengths and promote healthy development produce more positive results and are more cost-effective than strictly punitive measures. Grantees were urged to intervene with children early and to adopt programs that had been shown to be effective, such as life skills development, mentoring, conflict resolution, support for families, professional development for staff, truancy prevention, afterschool activities, teen courts, and alternative education.

Juvenile Justice Focuses on School Violence Recognizing the importance of addressing school violence, OJJDP in June 2001 devoted an issue of its journal, Juvenile Justice, to this subject. The issue’s three articles examine the extent and nature of school violence and review promising approaches to creating safe schools and resolving conflicts peacefully. Copies of Juvenile Justice (Volume VIII, Number 1, NCJ 188158) are available from the Juvenile Justice Clearinghouse.

Through a cooperative agreement with the Research Triangle Institute of Research Triangle, NC, OJJDP is collaborating with ED and HHS to conduct a national evaluation that will document the process and outcomes of the SS/HS Initiative. The National Mental Health Association of Alexandria, VA, through a cooperative agreement funded by OJJDP, ED, and HHS, has established the Safe Schools/Healthy Students Action Center to provide training and technical assistance to SS/HS sites and to provide other local education agencies, communities, and families with access to resources that can enhance their efforts to make schools safe. Information about the Action Center is available at http://sshs.samhsa.gov.

Title V Community Prevention Grants Program

The Title V Community Prevention Grants Program, established by the 1992 reauthorization of the Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention (JJDP) Act of 1974, is a Federal grants program that funds collaborative, community-based delinquency prevention efforts. The Title V Program integrates six fundamental principles—community control and decisionmaking, comprehensive and multidisciplinary approaches, research foundation for planning, leveraging of resources and systems, evaluation to monitor program progress and effectiveness, and a long-term perspective—that combine to form a strategic approach to reducing juvenile delinquency. The program provides communities with funding and a framework within which to develop and implement comprehensive juvenile delinquency prevention plans. The 3-year prevention plans are designed to reduce risk factors associated with juvenile delinquency and decrease the incidence of juvenile problem behaviors.

From 1994 to 2001, 1,246 communities in 49 States, the District of Columbia, and 5 territories (referred to collectively herein as “States”) received Title V subgrants to mobilize resources and implement comprehensive delinquency prevention plans. In FY 2001, OJJDP awarded more than $37.3 million under the Title V Program, with allocations ranging from a minimum of $100,000 to a maximum of $4,765,000. Four of the five territories received $33,000; Puerto Rico received $616,000, based on the size of its juvenile population.

In conjunction with the Title V funding process, OJJDP continues to provide training and technical assistance to help States and communities build their capacity to plan and implement effective prevention strategies. A core component of this assistance is the Title V training curriculum. OJJDP awarded funds to a new Title V training and technical assistance provider, Development Services Group, Inc. (DSG), on April 1, 2000. Since then, DSG has developed a training curriculum that emphasizes theory-based and evidence-based planning and includes three training sessions: Community Team Orientation, Community Data Collection and Analysis, and Community Plan and Program Development. DSG also maintains a Title V listserv and produces a Title V newsletter, Community Prevention: Title V Update, for States and local subgrantees. Other OJJDP-supported training activities in 2001 were designed to increase both the pool of certified Title V trainers and the geographic, linguistic, and ethnic diversity of the training team, with particular attention to Native Americans and rural communities.

During 2001, OJJDP also continued to support communities in selecting promising and effective prevention programs. The Promising and Effective Practices (PEP) Guide, developed in 2001, is designed to help communities select research-based prevention programs.

The seventh annual Report to Congress on Title V (2000 Report to Congress: Title V Community Prevention Grants Program) will be released in 2002. In addition to presenting the activities and accomplishments of the Title V Program, the Report to Congress will describe how States and communities across the Nation implemented the Community Prevention Grants Program in FY 2000 and examine their experiences and accomplishments. A copy of the Report to Congress will be available from the Juvenile Justice Clearinghouse. The 2001 Report to Congress will be published during 2002.

Truancy Reduction Activities

The goal of OJJDP’s Truancy Reduction Demonstration Program (TRDP) is to encourage communities to develop comprehensive approaches that involve schools, parents, the justice system, law enforcement, and social services agencies in identifying and tracking truant youth. The program is a collaborative effort of OJJDP, ED’s Safe and Drug-Free Schools Program, and DOJ’s Weed and Seed program, which supports communitywide efforts to “weed out” violent crime, gang activity, drug trafficking, and drug use and “seed in” social programs.

TRDP includes seven projects in six States (California, Florida, Hawaii, New York, Texas, and Washington) and serves more than 2,000 youth and more than 1,100 families. Communities in these sites are implementing programs that link truant youth with community-based services and programs. The sites vary in size—serving anywhere from 30 to 1,500 youth—and are diverse in geographic location, ethnic and sociodemographic makeup, and community-based leadership; however, all of the sites have a large number of minority students and families and a significant number of students and families living in poverty. Most programs also have strong family collaboration as a component.

Truancy reduction services vary among projects and include court diversions such as community truancy boards, truancy workshops, community awareness campaigns, and collaboration among community agencies. Truancy case managers usually work directly with youth and families, making home visits, monitoring school attendance, providing tutoring, and referring youth and families to community agencies as needed.

During 2001, OJJDP brought the funded sites together to participate in training on evaluation activities and maintaining collaborative partnerships and to share strategies on program implementation and sustainability. OJJDP staff also have been involved in several major conferences to provide information to the field on program development and evaluation. In addition to funding sites, OJJDP is funding a national evaluation of the project by the Colorado Foundation for Families and Children.

Additional information on OJJDP’s truancy reduction efforts appears in Truancy Reduction: Keeping Students in School, an OJJDP Bulletin released in September 2001 (NCJ 188947) that explores the link between truancy and serious delinquent activity in youth and significant negative behavior and characteristics in adults. Truancy Reduction highlights major research findings concerning truancy and explains why schools and communities should work to prevent and reduce the incidence of truancy. The Bulletin also discusses OJJDP’s truancy reduction efforts. The Bulletin is available from the Juvenile Justice Clearinghouse.

Understanding and Monitoring the “Whys” Behind Juvenile Crime Trends

Recognizing the need to understand unprecedented recent declines in the national rate of youth violence, OJJDP in August 2000 invited applications for a 5-year study, Understanding and Monitoring the “Whys” Behind Juvenile Crime Trends. The purpose of the research project is to develop theoretically sound, empirically grounded tools that can be used at the local level to explain and monitor trends in juvenile delinquency and violence. Applicants from qualified public and private agencies and organizations with demonstrated research abilities were eligible to apply for funding; applications were due in October 2000.

After reviewing the eight applications that were submitted, OJJDP selected the University of Pennsylvania Jerry Lee Center of Criminology to conduct the study of recent trends in juvenile crime and violence to better understand factors correlated with these trends and to predict future trends in delinquency and youth violence. During the first year, the research team, including the University of Maryland and the National Center for Juvenile Justice, began conducting a thorough review of the literature, identifying plausible theories to explain the trends. The project also undertook an indepth analysis of national statistical trends to examine various underlying patterns that may confirm or rebut some of the theories suggested in the literature review. The project focuses on national and local juvenile crime trends and is exploring a range of factors, including demographics; economics; public policy; Federal, State, and local programmatic and community initiatives; and spiritual and cultural trends and values, that may help explain the trends. The project’s ultimate goal is to build local capacity to better understand the “whys” behind juvenile crime trends by analyzing existing local data and/or collecting additional data. This data, in turn, will provide policymakers with valuable information about trends in juvenile crime.

FY 2002 funding will support the completion and dissemination of the analytical work begun in the first year of the project. In 2002, the study team will complete the review of the literature, examine national data on the reasons for changes in crime trends, and support developmental work to test hypotheses about the reasons for change at the local level in selected jurisdictions. The researchers will also carry out the research design, based on the results of the feasibility analysis, including plans for recruitment of sample sites for retrospective and prospective data collection, as appropriate.

Very Young Offenders Study Group

Juvenile courts today are challenged by an increase in the number of child delinquents (offenders younger than age 13) coming before them. In 1997, for example, juvenile courts handled more than 180,000 child offenders. Compared with youth who first become involved in delinquency in their teens, child delinquents are far more likely to become serious, violent, and chronic juvenile offenders. OJJDP’s Study Group on Serious and Violent Juvenile Offenders found that most chronic juvenile offenders begin their criminal careers before age 12 and some begin as early as age 10. The discovery that minor problem behavior leading to delinquency often begins at a very young age was a major basis for OJJDP’s decision to assemble its Study Group on Very Young Offenders (Study Group), a distinguished panel of 39 researchers who began work in 1998.

The Study Group was formed to explore what is known about the prevalence and frequency of very young offending; investigate how very young offenders are handled by the juvenile justice, mental health, and social services systems; and determine what methods can effectively prevent very young offending. Focusing on the delinquent behavior of offending children ages 7 to 12 and on their persistently disruptive and precociously deviant behavior from the toddler years through adolescence, the Study Group has reviewed existing research, undertaken many special analyses, secured input from more than 100 practitioners, and identified specific risk and protective factors that are critical to developing early intervention and protection programs for very young offenders.

The Study Group’s final report was completed in 2001 and subsequently published by Sage Publications as Child Delinquency: Development, Intervention, and Service Needs (edited by Rolf Loeber and David P. Farrington). The report draws on hundreds of research studies to provide information on child delinquency and its developmental course. Key findings include the following:

• The number of child delinquents (ages 7 to 12) handled in the Nation’s juvenile courts increased 33 percent during the past decade. This increase concerns researchers because offense patterns show more serious crimes among these youth and because very young offenders are more likely to continue their involvement in crime.

• Child delinquents are two to three times more likely to become serious, violent, and chronic offenders than adolescents whose delinquent behavior begins in their teens. (Chronic offenders are those with at least four referrals to juvenile court.)

• Between 1988 and 1997, the arrest rate of child delinquents for violent crimes increased 45 percent (paralleling the increase in violence for all juveniles). Arrests of child delinquents for drug abuse violations, however, increased 156 percent.

• Child delinquents account for one-third of all juvenile arrests for arson, one-fifth of juvenile arrests for sex offenses and vandalism, one-eighth of juvenile arrests for burglary and forcible rape, and one-twelfth of juvenile arrests for violent crime.

The Study Group’s final report also describes key risk and protective factors for delinquency. Many of the risk factors and predictors for child delinquency differ from those for offending by older youth. According to the Study Group’s report, risk factors for offending at a very young age are more likely to be biological, individual, and family factors. Individual risk factors include physical aggressiveness and hyperactive or impulsive behavior at a young age. Family risk factors include antisocial parents, substance-abusing parents, a history of family violence, and poor parenting practices. Peer and school/community risk factors and protective factors are also described in the final report.

In addition to determining risk and protective factors for child delinquency, the Study Group identified several effective and promising prevention and intervention programs. These programs not only help to reduce the incidence of delinquency but also provide significant cost savings to society.

The final report of OJJDP’s Study Group on Very Young Offenders will be summarized in Child Delinquency: Early Intervention and Prevention, an upcoming Bulletin in OJJDP’s Child Delinquency Bulletin Series. All Bulletins in the series will draw on information from the Study Group’s final report.

OJJDP encourages parents, educators, and practitioners to use information in the Bulletins to deal with young offenders more fairly and consistently. Three other Bulletins in the series—Treatment, Services, and Intervention Programs for Child Delinquents; Risk and Protective Factors of Child Delinquency; and Prevalence and Development of Child Delinquency—will also be published in this series.

Youth Violence Research Series

OJJDP and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s (CDC’s) National Center for Injury Prevention and Control have formed a strong partnership to reduce youth violence. Part of that partnership involves promotion of Blueprints for Violence Prevention, an initiative that identifies and disseminates information about violence prevention and intervention programs that have been found to be effective. The OJJDP–CDC partnership also recently introduced the Youth Violence Research Bulletin Series to present the most recent research findings on topics related to youth violence. The first Bulletin in the series (Short- and Long-Term Consequences of Adolescent Victimization) will be released in February 2002.

On the Horizon

In FY 2002, OJJDP will make a significant amount of funding available for programs designed to promote early intervention in juvenile crime and to prevent delinquency.

• Drug-Free Communities Support Program. In FY 2002, DFCSP will make available approximately 70 grants of up to $100,000 each through a competitive grant process. Eligible applicants will include community coalitions whose principal mission is reducing substance abuse among youth. Coalitions must represent the targeted community and include at least one representative from each of the following groups: youth; parents; business community; media; schools; youth-serving organizations; law enforcement agencies; religious or fraternal organizations; civic and volunteer groups; healthcare professionals; State, local, or tribal governmental agencies with expertise in the field of substance abuse; and other organizations involved in reducing substance abuse.

• Juvenile Mentoring Program. JUMP will award funding in FY 2002 to grantees interested in developing and sustaining effective mentoring programs for at-risk youth. Applications will be invited from local education agencies, public agencies, private for-profit and nonprofit organizations, and tribal nations. Faith-based organizations also will be encouraged to apply. Applicants will be required to demonstrate knowledge of and/or experience with mentoring programs, volunteers, and at-risk youth. National organizations (i.e., those serving a population that extends across the country) are not eligible to receive JUMP funds, and grantees or collaborative entities that have received JUMP funds previously will not be eligible for JUMP funding under this solicitation.

• Promising Programs for Substance Abuse Prevention: Replication and Evaluation Initiative. During FY 2002, OJJDP also plans to fund the Promising Programs for Substance Abuse Prevention: Replication and Evaluation Initiative. The purpose of this initiative is to replicate and test the effectiveness of two juvenile substance abuse prevention program models. In replicating these programs, OJJDP seeks to determine whether positive outcomes found in previous program evaluations can be replicated and sustained in other sites. Identifying programs that can be replicated and sustained in other sites enhances the field’s knowledge about “what works” in youth substance abuse prevention and helps communities make effective choices in allocating resources available for substance abuse prevention activities.