Mentors and peer counselors with lived experience are having a dramatic impact on services, supports, and community-building around the state and internationally. Young people and their families, especially in communities of color, are asking for support from people who have overcome similar challenges. To advocate the importance of this need, JR is expanding peer and mentor supports for young people in JR.

The individuals we work with have unique behavioral health needs and face disproportionate barriers. Increasing connections and supports to peer mentors with shared experience and background can impact these factors and build safe, strong communities through successful reentry. In collaboration with community and agency partners, these efforts include:

• Recruiting a peer support program specialist to lead agency efforts in this space.

• Piloting Peer Bridger reentry support with funding from Health Care Authority.

• Connecting young people to peer networks such as SPARK (Students Providing and Receiving Knowledge).
• Increasing access to WISe (Wrap Around with Intensive Services). Certified youth and parent peer counselors are key WISe team members in programs offered statewide.
• Providing culturally responsive mentoring through Relevant Engagement and Hope for Homies, and supporting peer-to-peer programs such as MADE Men  at Green Hill School.
• Convening a diverse consultation group with peers, advocates, youth, and staff to provide guidance to JR about growing agency capacity and supports for peer services.

By working with young people to identify goals, address individualized needs, and provide meaningful supports, DCYF is helping to set individuals up for success as they return to their community and transition into adulthood.

Click here to watch a presentation to the Governor about expanding peer services in JR.

New and ongoing research shows that solitary confinement and isolation are harmful and counterproductive to youth development and can be an ineffective intervention. Across the country, states are taking action to limit or end room confinement and isolation. During the 2020 Legislative Session, House Bill 2277 passed, prohibiting solitary confinement and limiting isolation and room confinement in Washington’s JR facilities.

DCYF has made great strides in reducing room confinement. Both Green Hill School and Naselle Youth Camp have received the Performance-based Standards (PbS) Barbara Allen-Hagen Award for reducing room confinement and improving practices on campus. Because of the strong foundations in place in JR’s secure facilities, DCYF was recently selected as one of four cohorts to participate in Georgetown University’s Ending Isolation in Youth Facilities Certificate program. The program is designed to support leaders in ending isolation and promoting positive outcomes for youth, staff, and communities.

Last fall, a team of DCYF research staff, Green Hill School direct care and mental health staff, JR headquarters staff, and a youth mentor/community partner headed to Washington, D.C. for a week-long training with national experts on cutting-edge ideas, policies, and practices. With this, they will implement a capstone pilot project at Green Hill School with support from Georgetown University. The project’s goal is to contribute to a culture of safety and well-being, with targeted strategies for engagement and de-escalation. If successful, Green Hill School may also be evaluated for certification as a promising practice site and serve as a model for others to replicate.

“We are so proud to have been selected as a pilot site,” said JR Assistant Secretary Felice Upton. “As part of our firm commitment to trauma-informed environments, we are dedicated to eliminating isolation and the harm it causes. Within trauma-informed environments, our young people and employees are supported and protected while significantly disrupting the school-to-prison pipeline.” 

My name is Devin, I’m 16 years old, and I have been here at Echo Glen for a whole year now. There are many things I have learned about myself that have been helpful, especially in my counseling sessions. These sessions have helped me reflect on the negative behaviors that I have not realized throughout my adolescent years. Overcoming my interpersonal challenges made me see my characteristic flaws. I was very egotistic, judgmental, and not open to feedback and thought I was right all the time. It took me a long time to learn to disengage from arguments and not to initiate them.

Within the year of my stay here at Echo, I have attended the following groups: LGBTQ+, Aggression Replacement Training, Dialectical Behavior Therapy, Mindfulness, and Covenant Of Brothers. In addition to the therapy group, I was hired to work in the barista program to build work skills in customer service, communication, food industry services, operating a business, cash/sell transactions, and being a team player.

Moreover, the Canine Connections program has made a huge impact on my outlook on life. The Canine Connections Rescue and Therapy programs have taught me compassion due to the experience of working with abused animals, which many of us here at Echo Glen can resonate with. These animals have placed my perspective on acceptance and unconditional love with judgment, neglect, and abuse. It has helped improve my mental and emotional growth.  

I was able to develop an open mindset, to understand diversity, to accept that everybody comes from different backgrounds, and to be empathetic that each resident here has gone through things, and that I should not judge them for what they look like or what they have done in their past.

Transitioning back into the community, I will take what I’ve learned from my stay here at Echo Glen and apply it to my life in my community. Being here, seeing and experiencing many things have motivated me, with a strong desire to be a mentor in my community to help at-risk youth.

DCYF proposed a bill to the Legislature that would repeal RCW 13.40.220, Washington’s “Parent Pay” statute, which charges families for their child’s incarceration. The law currently requires parents to pay a percentage of their income to DCYF for the cost of their child’s support, treatment, and confinement in JR. It disproportionately impacts low-income families and represents a dated policy and philosophy that are not aligned with current racial equity and social justice reforms.

“It puts families at risk,” said one parent of a youth in JR care. “They’re going to garnish [wages]. You don’t have a choice on how much to pay or when to pay. You have to choose between vehicle, rent, food – something has to go if you’re going to pay it. It impacts the whole family in a negative way.”

Pursuing these parents is unfair and sometimes forces them to make impossible trade-offs when they are most vulnerable. Placing them in debt may also result in unstable home environments, which impedes successful youth reentry back into the community. Eliminating parents’ financial obligation to pay for their child’s incarceration advances racial equity and supports successful transition into adulthood for the youth in our care, two of DCYF’s strategic priorities.

For more information on this agency request legislation, read the Parent Pay fact sheet. 

Successfully transitioning young people into adulthood is at the forefront of JR’s work to implement DCYF’s Strategic and Racial Equity Plan. A successful transition prepares young people for independence through education, employment, life skills, strong relationships, and more. Through strategic partnerships and meaningful career pathways, JR is ensuring young people are thoughtfully supported in gaining the skills and experience needed to flourish in adulthood.

To fortify this endeavor, JR is expanding its K-12 educational programming and developing post-secondary pathways to adequately serve young people in our system up to the age of 25. We currently partner with 11 colleges across Washington, and students have the opportunity to have their college expenses paid while in residence. We are also developing additional partnerships with colleges and community to ensure multiple education and career pathways for the youth and young adults in our care.

JR’s framework for guided pathways includes a variety of choices that prepare individuals for living-wage jobs and careers. These pathways include registered pre-apprenticeships, career and technical education, academic pathways, and post-release education connections. A few shining examples of this work include:

• A partnership with Relevant Engagement, which provides students with culturally-relevant education, confidence, and critical thinking skills to help identify their passions and strengths.
• The Enterprise for Equity program, which provides workshops to help students learn about money management, financial goals, budgeting, and credit.
• A partnership with ANEW, which provides quality training, employment navigation, and real-world application of multiple construction trades.
• The Beauty from Ashes program, which provides health and wellness training and certification for students wanting to become fitness trainers, nutritionists, or coaches.
• A partnership with Columbia Basin Technical Skills Center, which provides high school-age students with education in culinary arts, engineering, cosmetology, and more.
• The Manufacturing Academy, a 12-week pre-apprenticeship where participants can earn seven certifications that prepare them for positions in the manufacturing industry.
• A partnership with A Better Track/MyJOB, which provides employment education training, including resume building, interviewing, and employment readiness skills. 

Upon release to the community, JR youth and young adults are referred to a DCYF employment/education coordinator, who supports them in their job search and employment onboarding. The coordinator stays current with local labor market trends and employment opportunities and maintains relationships with a variety of businesses, industry representatives, and job placement agencies to promote hiring JR young adults.

To learn more about employment pathways in JR, click here.

Suicide prevention is a top priority in JR.

“Many of our first-time residents arrive feeling terrified of what they will experience, while returning residents arrive feeling hopeless that they are with us again,” said Clinical Training Consultant Beth Rogers. “In either case, residents can become suicidal and begin to see ending their life as a way of ending their pain and their family’s suffering.”

JR is committed to helping these youth reduce their suicidal ideation while increasing their hope for their future. 

When a youth enters a JR institution or transfers to a community facility, they are screened for any suicidal ideation or self-harm intentions using an evidence-based Suicide and Self-Harm Screen (SSS). After conducting the screen and reviewing the youth’s background, if JR staff believe the youth should be placed on a Suicide Precaution Level (SPL), they contact a Designated Suicide Prevention Specialist (DSPS) and discuss their findings and concerns. After reviewing all of the information provided, the DSPS determines which level SPL the youth will be placed on.

JR has a three-level suicide precaution protocol. Depending on the level the youth is placed, the youth may have constant observation or as little as random checks, with a maximum interval of 15 minutes. Staff are specifically trained on how to conduct the SSSs and therapeutically intervene when youth are suicidal or have self-harming ideation. 

JR has not had a completed in-residence suicide in 20 years and also uses Dialectical Behavior Therapy (DBT) as an effective therapeutic intervention to help youth experiencing crisis. Read this article penned by DBT expert Beth Rogers to learn more.