Impact of Juvenile Justice Involvement on Educational Outcomes

摘要

Despite its increased emphasis on punishment and accountability, juvenile justice policy still coheres around rehabilitative aims such as the placement and reentry of adjudicated youth into appropriate educational settings. However, theories of the impact of sanctions such as labeling and defiance as well as exclusionary trends in public schools suggest that juvenile sanctions may actually hinder the performance and enrollment for inner-city youth. This prediction was largely confirmed in empirical research involving a sample of 778 urban youth of color who were arrested at least once. Separate subsamples of youth arrested while enrolled in seventh, eighth, or ninth grade, respectively, are compared, with respect to subsequent school performance in that grade, to youth from the same grade who are arrested in the subsequent grade. The results of these quasi-experimental, multivariate comparisons suggest that first arrest has no main effect on math and reading achievement test scores during seventh and eighth grade, but it does increase the odds of repeating eighth grade. During ninth grade, being arrested dramatically increases the risk of dropping out, and substantially lowers attendance and grades.