Teen Court: A National Movement
Evaluation
Teen court advocates generally agree that their most important goals are educating
young participants about the judicial process, having a positive impact on participants'
social competence, providing victims with apologies and/or restitution, and providing
service to the community. Preventing repeat offenses (recidivism) and influencing young
people to resist the temptation to become delinquent are also valid goals of teen courts.
Since teen courts tend to function on minimal funding, finding the time and money to
determine their success in meeting their goals has been difficult. Following are summaries
of a few of the evaluations to date.
Rod Hissong's evaluation (1991) of a teen court program in Arlington, Texas, matched
offenders sentenced by teen court with non-teen court participants who had
contemporaneously committed similar offenses. From a sample of 392 teen-agers over a
period of 24 months, the research found that only 25 percent of the individuals who
participated in teen court had recidivated by the end of the study, while 36 percent of
the teens not involved in teen court had recidivated.
The North Carolina Administrative Office of the Courts' "Report on Teen Court
Programs in North Carolina" (1995) stated that the two most important effects
suggested by interviews with persons familiar with teen court were (A) juveniles were
processed in a manner that demonstrated to them that there were consequences to their
misbehavior and (B) teen court was a learning and behavior-modification experience for
both offenders and volunteers. The report found no difference in the tendency to
recidivate for the teen court and the pre-program (control) group that was not accounted
for by the factors of age and type of offense*.
SRA Associates' evaluation (Jones 1995) of Routes For Youth—Teen Court in Santa
Rosa, California, measured five program-related outcomes:
- A reduction in recidivism among the target population. During the 18-month period of
evaluation, only 2.5 percent of 238 teen court referrals were reported by Juvenile
Probation as re-arrests.
- Law-related education. In 1994, 380 young people took part in teen court training,
learning basic courtroom procedure and protocol. In addition, trainees were mentored by
adult attorneys in listening and communications skill, traditional conflict mediation
techniques, and how to research and analyze police reports effectively.
- The provision of opportunities for a positive collaborative relationship between law
enforcement and the youth community. The program's requirement that defendants accept
responsibility for their actions before participating in teen court, the courtroom process
that demands accountability from the offender in terms of restitution and community
service, and the participation of youth volunteers in the court process demonstrated a
positive collaboration between law enforcement and the youth community.
- The collection and distribution of financial restitution. In 1994, a total of $2,806 in
financial restitution (median amount was $71.50) was collected and distributed to crime
victims.
- The contribution of community service. A total of 4,008 community-service hours (median
was 25 hours served) were provided by youth offenders in a wide variety of public and
not-for-profit agencies.
James B. Wells and Kevin I. Minor's evaluation (1997) of Kentucky's Teen Court Program
assessed teen courts in several sites around the state using a variety of data collection
strategies, including knowledge tests, attitudinal measures, field observations, exit
evaluations, and recidivism data. Following are their central findings:
- With minor exception, defendants provided with both pretest and posttest data showed
gains in knowledge test scores.
- Participants' posttest scores suggested moderately high attitudes toward teen court.
- Most participants' parents perceived their children as benefiting a great deal from the
teen court experience.
- Information from a limited number of participants indicated that the most positive
features of teen court were learning about the legal system and deterring defendants and
others from committing offenses.
- The recidivism rate from cases processed in the 1994-95 session was 37 percent.
Compliance with teen court sentences was found to be associated with a reduced likelihood
of recidivism. Gender, age, and prior offenses were not related to recidivism.
Recognizing the need for more evaluative information about teen courts, the Office of
Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention awarded a major grant to the Urban Institute
in 1998 to conduct a national evaluation of teen courts. The evaluation will measure the
effect of handling young, nonserious law violators in a teen court rather than in juvenile
court. Researchers will collect data on several dimensions of program outcomes, including
post-program recidivism, changes in teen's perceptions of justice, and their ability to
make more mature judgments. In addition, the study will conduct a process evaluation of
the teen court programs, exploring legal, administrative, and case processing factors that
affect the ability of the programs to achieve their goals. Results will become available
when the project is completed in the year 2000**.
* Data collected on all juveniles referred to
teen court during an eight-month period in 1993–94 was compared to data collected on
juveniles who were diverted by the police and intake during the same period in
1992–93 (contemporaneous subjects were not available for comparison). Although an
effort was made to match the control sample to the teen court sample (police and intake
were asked to screen the control group to select only those who they would have been
referred to teen court had it been an available resource at the time), substantive changes
in policy and procedure resulted in a larger number of driving, weapon, controlled
substance, and alcohol offenses in the teen court sample. The brevity of the evaluation
period was due to the minimum time available for tracking teen court participants (the
program was relatively new).
** For further information, contact: Jeffrey A.
Butts, Ph.D., Senior Research Associate, The Urban Institute, Program on Law &
Behavior, 2100 M Street, NW, Washington, DC 20037, (202) 261-5514, Fax (202) 659-8985, JButts@ui.urban.org
>>What are teen courts?
>>The Growth of Teen Courts
>>The Major Models
>>Steps for Implementing a Teen Court
>>Teen Courts and Law-Related Education
>>Delinquency Prevention; The Educational Role
>>Training
>>Profile: Salt Lake City's Peer Court
>>Student Courts
>>How Do Lawyers, Judges, and the Bar Support Teen
Courts?
>>Profile: A Lawyer's Inside View of Teen Court
>>Profile: The Wyoming Bar and Teen Court
>>Evaluation
>>Funding
>>Conclusion and References
>>Resources and Additional Information
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