Apply Now: Transforming Juvenile Probation 2026 Certificate Program

George­town University’s Cen­ter for Youth Jus­tice (CYJ) is now accept­ing appli­ca­tions for the Trans­form­ing Juve­nile Pro­ba­tion Cer­tifi­cate Pro­gram. The week-long cer­tifi­cate pro­gram, offered with sup­port from the Annie E. Casey Foun­da­tion, aids state and local juris­dic­tions in adopt­ing a safer, youth-cen­tered approach to juve­nile probation.

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What Is the Trans­form­ing Juve­nile Pro­ba­tion Cer­tifi­cate Program?

“This is an oppor­tu­ni­ty for juris­dic­tions to ful­ly shift the role of pro­ba­tion away from sur­veil­lance and com­pli­ance and toward pro­mot­ing per­son­al growth, pos­i­tive behav­ior change and long-term suc­cess for youth,” said Steve Bish­op, asso­ciate direc­tor of Pro­ba­tion and Sys­tem Trans­for­ma­tion in the Foundation’s Juve­nile Jus­tice Strat­e­gy Group.

What Can I Expect From the Trans­form­ing Juve­nile Pro­ba­tion Program?

The 2026 pro­gram will run from June 8 to 12 in Wash­ing­ton, D.C. Prac­ti­tion­ers, researchers, pol­i­cy­mak­ers and com­mu­ni­ty rep­re­sen­ta­tives will present on an array of top­ics, including:

• incor­po­rat­ing prac­tices for fair­ness and oppor­tu­ni­ty for all;
• youth, fam­i­ly and com­mu­ni­ty part­ner­ship and empowerment;
• diver­sion as an off-ramp from the for­mal jus­tice system;
• deci­sion mak­ing about the length and inten­si­ty of pro­ba­tion terms;
• roles of pro­ba­tion offi­cers; and 
• lead­ing trans­for­ma­tion­al change.

The pro­gram can accom­mo­date up to five teams that will devel­op and imple­ment a cap­stone project to trans­form their jurisdiction’s work. Dur­ing this time, they will receive tech­ni­cal assis­tance on a vari­ety of fronts, such as:

• devel­op­ing and imple­ment­ing new poli­cies and practices;
• train­ing staff and stake­hold­ers to pro­mote buy-in and col­lab­o­ra­tion; and
• assess­ing, eval­u­at­ing and sus­tain­ing progress.

Upon approval of a team’s cap­stone project, its mem­bers will earn an exec­u­tive cer­tifi­cate from George­town Uni­ver­si­ty and join CYJ’s net­work of over 2,100 fel­lows. The uni­ver­si­ty will also pro­vide teams with exten­sive tech­ni­cal assis­tance to sup­port plan­ning and imple­men­ta­tion at home.

Who Should Apply?

Each team may have up to 10 mem­bers and must include: 

• a core pro­ba­tion team:
  • chief pro­ba­tion officer;
  • field pro­ba­tion supervisor/​deputy; and
  • line staff member.
• a judge (the pre­sid­ing juve­nile or fam­i­ly court judge or their designee);
• a pros­e­cu­tor (e.g., dis­trict attor­ney, coun­ty attorney);
• a youth rep­re­sen­ta­tive who is 18–25 years old and has either per­son­al expe­ri­ence with the youth jus­tice sys­tem or anoth­er form of prox­im­i­ty to the issues (e.g., advo­ca­cy, com­mu­ni­ty ties or aca­d­e­m­ic engagement);
• a leader of a com­mu­ni­ty-based orga­ni­za­tion com­mit­ted to pos­i­tive youth devel­op­ment and cross-sys­tem col­lab­o­ra­tion on behalf of young peo­ple with jus­tice-sys­tem involve­ment; and
• a defense attor­ney (e.g., pub­lic defend­er or youth defender).

The appli­ca­tion also rec­om­mends oth­er team mem­bers, includ­ing the law enforce­ment offi­cial who leads the juve­nile division.

The ide­al team also demon­strates most or all of the fol­low­ing characteristics:

• a com­mit­ment to com­pre­hen­sive pro­ba­tion transformation;
• a his­to­ry of effec­tive imple­men­ta­tion of juve­nile jus­tice reforms;
• a desire to imple­ment inno­v­a­tive prac­tices and be a nation­al leader in trans­form­ing youth justice;
• a his­to­ry of suc­cess­ful col­lab­o­ra­tion among agen­cies, pub­lic sys­tems and com­mu­ni­ty stake­hold­ers; and
• the orga­ni­za­tion­al and data capac­i­ty to sup­port pro­ba­tion transformation.

What Do Past Par­tic­i­pants Say?

Rosie Med­i­na, the chief pro­ba­tion offi­cer who led the El Paso Coun­ty, Texas, team, not­ed the ​“unequiv­o­cal val­ue” of par­tic­i­pat­ing in the 2022 cer­tifi­cate pro­gram. She cit­ed the tech­ni­cal assis­tance and train­ing as crit­i­cal to the ​“imple­men­ta­tion of strate­gies that will be sus­tain­able and will yield improved out­comes for youth involved in our sys­tem as we look into the future.”

Hen­ry Gon­za­les, Medina’s coun­ter­part in Har­ris Coun­ty, Texas, appre­ci­at­ed the oppor­tu­ni­ty to learn from the expe­ri­ences and insights of oth­ers in the field. ​“Active engage­ment in the pro­gram cre­ates space for con­ver­sa­tion that pro­motes curios­i­ty about doing things dif­fer­ent­ly,” he said.

How Do Teams Apply?

• Down­load the appli­ca­tion pack­et to learn more about the cur­ricu­lum, appli­ca­tion process, selec­tion cri­te­ria and cost of participating.
• Sub­mit your appli­ca­tion by Wednes­day, March 4, 2026.

WATCH A THREE-MINUTE VIDEO ON PRO­BA­TION OFFI­CERS AS COACH­ES, NOT REFEREES

LEARN ABOUT CASEY’S VISION FOR PRO­BA­TION TRANSFORMATION