Girls Need Our Attention

1. Girls Need Our Attention Best practices, supports, and mentoring for incarcerated girls

2. Purpose of this Session • Educate about trends and issues facing justice-impacted girls and young women • Encourage and empower your work with justice-impacted girls • Highlight the importance of mentoring and demystify the process • Humanize incarcerated girls and young women and contextualize their behaviors • Discuss needs for the future

3. About Me • Teacher with the San Diego JCCS for 22 years • SOAR Kearny Mesa in Juvenile Hall 14 years • 10 years in the Youthful Offender Unit (Y.O.U.) This unit houses girls who have been charged with serious crimes, or have placement issues due to multiple repeated behavioral issues.

4. Why Girls? What I See • Steady increase in population • The crimes girls are committing are becoming more violent • Mental Health disorders • PTSD • Depression • Increased population of transgender females and males • Substance Abuse • Fewer pregnancies

5. The Data Let’s look at some data regarding girls and three major issues they face: • Mental Health • Trauma • Criminal Justice What do you already see? What do you find most surprising? What do you already do to help?

6. Why Girls? Mental Health • Girls are far more likely than boys to develop PTSD, depression, and other internalized behaviors from exposure to traumatic events.Girls in correctional and detention facilities experience major depression at a rate four to five times that of girls the general community. • Suicide rate among girls reached a 40-year high in 2015. The proportion of high school girls seriously considered suicide is continuing to trend higher. • The last 15 years have seen an unprecedented rise in reported mental health problems amongst young women and girls. • Girls in correctional and detention facilities experience major depression at a rate four to five times that of girls the general community.

7. Why Girls? Trauma • Individuals with high ACE scores (reflecting multiple childhood traumas) can struggle with educational attainment. Exposure to trauma can impact school performance, resulting in lower GPAs, a higher number of school absences, decreased reading ability, more suspensions and expulsions, and a higher dropout rate. • In a study of ACEs among justice-involved youth, 45% of girls had experienced five or more ACEs, making their rate of complex trauma nearly twice as high as boys. The rate of sexual abuse for girls who are involved in the juvenile justice system is four times higher than it is for boys. • Girls’ mental health outcomes from trauma are also more pronounced than their male peers: over 65 percent of girls had experienced symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) at sometime in their lives.

8. Why Girls? Criminal Justice • Girls of color have the highest rates of confinement in juvenile facilities for non-violent status offenses typically associated with responses to underlying trauma—like truancy, curfew violations, and running away—that are only punishable because of a young person’s age. • Girls who spend time in juvenile detention facilities are nearly five times more likely to die before age 29. • Women of color are the fastest growing jail population. Although the overall crime rate is decreasing, the crimes committed by juvenile girls is increasingly violent. • Sexual abuse is a “primary predictor” for involvement with the juvenile justice system and girls of color are disproportionately affected.

9. What can we do? • Trauma informed care • Mindfulness and Meditation; yoga • Emotional Intelligence Education • Restorative Practices • MTSS (Multi-Tiered Systems of Support) • Mentoring Programs • Wrap-around services • eg. Transition Specialists

10. Why Mentoring? “Perhaps the most serious risk facing adolescents in high-risk settings is isolation from the nurturance, safety, and guidance that comes from sustained relationships with adults.”* “… seeing me as an individual has given me an opportunity to see my worth” Q.

11. Mentoring Programs in San Diego • Jessie Program (2010-2016) • Started under the Student Support Services dept of SDCOE • Volunteer run; passionate people who did the work and fundraising; • Project DETOUR Empowers (2018-present) • Funded through the SSC • Challenges getting started with mentors “My mentor gives me hope. It’s nice knowing that someone cares.” E.

12. Mentor Program Administration Purpose: To mentor and support girls for successful transition to their homes, schools, and community for reducing recidivism and mitigating repeat offenses. • Girls voluntarily applied for a mentor • Girls who were considered for mentoring needed to achieve stable status with their own program in detention. (decreased negative behavior, on track with academics, etc.) • Provided weekly educational sessions on various topics such as Healthy relationships, violence, chemical dependency, alcohol and pregnancy, communication skills, conflict resolution, and other topics requested by girls. • Girls were 1:1 matched with a mentor after completing their application and mentors completed all portions of their screening.

13. What Do Girls Need From You? • To have compassion • To be a role model and guide • To be consistent and follow through • To push them to be their best • To care • To not judge them • To expose them to new & healthy experiences • Every day is a new day and a chance to make a change.

14. What is Success? Planting Seeds Success is going to look different for every girl.

15. Q&A What would you like to know more about? How can we support and learn from each other? Best practices to share

16. For any further information or assistance, please feel free to contact us. Sarah Haffey:shatch@sdcoe.net Link to Resource List Here

17. Resources Used in this presentation Center for the Study of Social Policy, 2016 YWCA, 2018 Girls Scouts, 2017 Journal of Aggression, Maltreatment & Trauma, 2015 OJJDP, 2019 PACE Center for Girls, 2016 Center for Disease Control (2017) Education Week 2015

18. Resources Guidebooks for Mentoring ProgramsBilchik, Shay, Mentoring: A Promising Intervention for Children of Prisoners, Research in Action Series, 32 pgs. free download via www.mentoring.org Borden, Cindy, Implementing Effective Youth Mentoring Relationships for High School Students, US Dept. of Ed. 2007National Mentoring Center, Effective Strategies for Providing Quality Youth Mentoring in Schools and Communities: A Guide for New Mentors, 48 pgs. 2007De Anda, Diane, A Qualitative Evaluation of a Mentor Program for At-risk Youth: The Participants Perspectives. 22 pgs. 2001 free download @ www.sites.highlands.edu

19. Resources BooksGirls like Us, by Rachel Lloyd. Autobiography and linking research on Sexual Exploitation of Children and Human Trafficking.Piece of Cake, by Cupcake Brown. AutobiographyRunaway Girl: Escaping the life on the Streets, by Carissa Phelps, AutobiographyThe Body Keeps the Score: Brain, Mind, and Body in the Healing of Trauma, by Bessel van der Kolk M.D. Caught Up: Girls, Surveillance, and Wraparound Incarceration (Gender and Justice), by Jerry Flores.

20. Resources PodcastsWhat Were You Thinking? by Dina Temple-Raston. On AudibleOn Sarah’s ListBehave: The Biology of Humans at Our Best and Worst, by Robert M. SapolskyThe Power of Vulnerability: Teachings of Authenticity, Connection, and Courage, by Brené Brown, PhD.