FAQ: 2023 Training-for-Trainers Institute for Reimagining Juvenile Justice

1. What is Reimag­in­ing Juve­nile Justice?
2. How has RJJ grown and expanded?
3. Who can apply for the RJJ 6.0 Train­ing-for-Train­ers Institute? 
4. What cri­te­ria will be used to assess an applicant’s readi­ness for this opportunity?
5. Who should a site select as train­ers to par­tic­i­pate in the RJJ 6.0 Train­ing-for-Train­ers Institute?
6. What is the RJJ cur­ricu­lum and how is it delivered?
7. How do I apply to par­tic­i­pate in the RJJ 6.0 Train­ing-for-Train­ers Institute? 
8. What is the cost to par­tic­i­pate in the RJJ institute?
9. How can I learn more about RJJ before appli­ca­tions are due?
10. Key dates for RJJ 6.0 T4T in 2023 
11. Who can I con­tact for addi­tion­al questions?

1. What is Reimag­in­ing Juve­nile Justice?

Reimag­in­ing Juve­nile Jus­tice (RJJ) is a pro­fes­sion­al devel­op­ment ini­tia­tive designed and deliv­ered by School & Main Insti­tute (SMI), a nation­al­ly rec­og­nized non­prof­it train­ing orga­ni­za­tion locat­ed in Mass­a­chu­setts. RJJ advances many of the core ele­ments of pos­i­tive youth devel­op­ment, which are approach­es that iden­ti­fy the pos­i­tive aspects of a young person’s life and build on those strengths and inter­ests. RJJ is spon­sored by the Annie E. Casey Foundation.

The train­ing pro­gram is tar­get­ed to pro­fes­sion­als work­ing with youth and their fam­i­lies involved in the juve­nile jus­tice sys­tem and aims to devel­op the capac­i­ty of pro­fes­sion­als to sup­port, divert and redi­rect youth to appro­pri­ate and fair jus­tice options, includ­ing those requir­ing a high degree of cross-sys­tem col­lab­o­ra­tion and coor­di­na­tion. RJJ is based on research on ado­les­cent devel­op­ment that demon­strates youth thrive in a pos­i­tive envi­ron­ment with the sup­port of car­ing adults. RJJ’s pos­i­tive youth devel­op­ment frame­work encour­ages juve­nile jus­tice pro­fes­sion­als to focus on young people’s pro­tec­tive fac­tors and strengths, rather than mere­ly focus­ing on risk fac­tors and problems.

Train­ing in RJJ is found­ed on a core cur­ricu­lum of six course mod­ules orig­i­nal­ly designed by SMI in 2016 with the input and assis­tance of spe­cial­ists and pro­fes­sion­als in the field of youth work, child wel­fare and youth jus­tice. The mod­ules are con­tin­u­ous­ly updat­ed with cur­rent infor­ma­tion from the field.

2. How has RJJ grown and expanded?

Through 2022, the RJJ cur­ricu­lum has reached near­ly 1,000 indi­vid­u­als rep­re­sent­ing a broad array of agen­cies and orga­ni­za­tions, includ­ing pro­ba­tion, juve­nile deten­tion, child wel­fare, youth and fam­i­ly ser­vices, courts, local law enforce­ment, school dis­tricts, com­mu­ni­ty-based agen­cies and oth­ers involved in the youth jus­tice sys­tem, includ­ing youth and fam­i­lies. Here is a snap­shot of how the RJJ mod­el has grown and evolved:

• 2016–17: The RJJ cur­ricu­lum was pilot­ed by SMI in Mass­a­chu­setts with 21 professionals.
• 2018: RJJ 2.0 was repli­cat­ed in the Pima Coun­ty JDAI^® site, locat­ed in Tuc­son, Ari­zona; 28 par­tic­i­pants com­plet­ed the training.
• 2019: RJJ 3.0 launched the first RJJ Train­ing-for-Train­ers (T4T) Insti­tute to help fur­ther expand the initiative’s nation­al foot­print. Fol­low­ing a com­pet­i­tive appli­ca­tion process, 15 sites were select­ed, includ­ing eight states — four of which part­nered with coun­ty enti­ties — and sev­en local juris­dic­tions. The first RJJ 3.0 T4T Insti­tute was held in per­son in May 2019 and pro­vid­ed a unique, hands-on train­ing expe­ri­ence for teams of two from each select­ed juris­dic­tion. The insti­tute was designed to equip train­ers with the con­cepts, cur­ricu­lum and instruc­tion­al approach nec­es­sary to bring RJJ back to their home juris­dic­tion; these train­ers then deliv­ered the RJJ cur­ricu­lum to over 450 addi­tion­al youth jus­tice pro­fes­sion­als between July 2019 and Jan­u­ary 2020, and many con­tin­ued to facil­i­tate deliv­ery of the RJJ cur­ricu­lum through both vir­tu­al and in-per­son sessions.
• 2020: RJJ 4.0 launched the sec­ond T4T Insti­tute. As a result of the pan­dem­ic, SMI adjust­ed the train­ing design to be facil­i­tat­ed entire­ly online. Through a com­pet­i­tive process, 16 juris­dic­tions from around the coun­try were select­ed; a total of 60 par­tic­i­pants enrolled, rep­re­sent­ing teams of three to five mem­bers from each site. Despite the chal­lenges of bring­ing the train­ing ful­ly remote, this new cadre of train­ers went on to deliv­er the cur­ricu­lum to over 300 local par­tic­i­pants pri­mar­i­ly via vir­tu­al train­ing ses­sions. In addi­tion, SMI began trans­lat­ing the course mod­ules into a full eLearn­ing environment.
• 2022: RJJ 5.0 ini­ti­at­ed a com­pet­i­tive appli­ca­tion process, select­ing 11 juris­dic­tions that field­ed teams of three to five par­tic­i­pants in a new hybrid approach. The cur­ricu­lum was deliv­ered to 53 pro­fes­sion­als through both facil­i­tat­ed vir­tu­al ses­sions and an in-per­son RJJ T4T Insti­tute held in Octo­ber 2022. Train­ers began rolling out deliv­ery of RJJ in their com­mu­ni­ties in ear­ly 2023. Addi­tion­al­ly, SMI released a free, ful­ly online ver­sion of the cur­ricu­lum. 

What does the RJJ 6.0 Train­ing-for-Train­ers (T4T) Insti­tute look like in 2023?

As part of efforts to grow the capac­i­ty of com­mu­ni­ty and sys­tems part­ners to deliv­er RJJ prin­ci­ples and con­cepts in their home juris­dic­tions, this year the RJJ T4T Insti­tute seeks to deep­en the engage­ment and lead­er­ship of young adults who have had direct expe­ri­ence in the juve­nile jus­tice sys­tem with­in the last 12 years and are now between 18 and 30 years old. These young lead­ers will serve as co-design­ers, part­ners and co-train­ers of RJJ in their com­mu­ni­ty. (See #4 on Authen­tic Youth Engagement.)

RJJ 6.0 seeks to select six (6) new jurisdictions/​sites that com­mit to the following:

• Under­stand­ing the tenets, core con­cepts and prin­ci­ples with­in RJJ and agree­ing to fos­ter and apply these prin­ci­ples with­in their youth jus­tice system.
• Field­ing a team of four (4) train­ers who will be charged with design­ing and facil­i­tat­ing the local deliv­ery of RJJ. Pref­er­ence will be giv­en to sites who are able to include one or two young adults with expe­ri­ence in the youth jus­tice sys­tem as co-train­ers (see #4 on Authen­tic Youth Engage­ment) paired with two or three adult professionals.
• Iden­ti­fy­ing a lead­er­ship group or net­work, includ­ing a des­ig­nat­ed point of con­tact, to help pro­mote, guide, sup­port and fol­low through with the RJJ imple­men­ta­tion process. This group should ful­ly sup­port RJJ prin­ci­ples of prac­tice and the team’s jour­ney in facil­i­tat­ing RJJ imple­men­ta­tion and should be open and recep­tive to emerg­ing pol­i­cy and prac­tice rec­om­men­da­tions that arise from the train­ing. Pref­er­ence will be giv­en to appli­cants who are com­mit­ted to authen­tic part­ner­ship with young adults and to cre­at­ing oppor­tu­ni­ties for them to devel­op and acti­vate lead­er­ship skills.
• Pro­vid­ing paid release time for all adult pro­fes­sion­als and young adult train­ing team mem­bers to ful­ly par­tic­i­pate in the fol­low­ing activities:
1. required RJJ prepa­ra­tion ses­sions and peer-to-peer learn­ing opportunities;
2. facil­i­tat­ed dis­cus­sions with the nation­al RJJ team;
3. the on-site RJJ T4T Insti­tute in Den­ver, Col­orado, in Sep­tem­ber 2023; and
4. the deliv­ery of the RJJ course mod­ules between Octo­ber 2023 and April 2024.
• Send­ing their four-per­son RJJ facil­i­ta­tion team to the RJJ 6.0 T4T In-Per­son Insti­tute in Den­ver, Col­orado, which will be held Sep­tem­ber 12–14, 2023. A required com­po­nent of RJJ train­ing, this 2.5‑day event is ded­i­cat­ed to devel­op­ing RJJ team rela­tion­ships and pro­vid­ing oppor­tu­ni­ties for par­tic­i­pants to prac­tice roles as train­ers of RJJ mod­ule con­cepts and prin­ci­ples. At the T4T Insti­tute, teams will net­work with their peers from across the coun­try and learn from expert nation­al staff and pre­vi­ous RJJ train­ers about their per­son­al expe­ri­ence deliv­er­ing the train­ing and changes that have emerged as a result.

3. Who can apply for the RJJ 6.0 Train­ing-for-Train­ers Institute?

Pub­lic sys­tems or gov­ern­ment agen­cies that work with youth in the jus­tice sys­tem may serve as the lead appli­cant. The lead appli­cant must apply togeth­er with a local or state non-prof­it enti­ty as a co-appli­cant or part­ner in this initiative.

• Exam­ples of pub­lic sys­tems are juve­nile court, pro­ba­tion, law enforce­ment and education.
• Exam­ples of local or state non-prof­it part­ners include com­mu­ni­ty-based orga­ni­za­tions or net­works of part­ners pro­vid­ing diver­sion, alter­na­tives to con­fine­ment and/​or sup­port for youth involved in the juve­nile jus­tice system.

4. What cri­te­ria will be used to assess an applicant’s readi­ness for this opportunity?

Lead­er­ship Com­mit­ment: Trans­for­ma­tive work is long term. Reimag­in­ing juve­nile jus­tice requires res­olute lead­ers who pro­mote and sup­port sys­tems change and are com­mit­ted to fos­ter­ing a pos­i­tive youth devel­op­ment mind­set with a cross-sys­tems approach with­in their com­mu­ni­ty and/​or jurisdiction.

• Appli­cants must iden­ti­fy a lead­er­ship group or net­work of sys­tem and com­mu­ni­ty part­ners with the author­i­ty and influ­ence to address poli­cies and prac­tices with­in their respec­tive agen­cies and pro­grams. The group or net­work must include a lead­er­ship role rep­re­sent­ing at least one juve­nile jus­tice sys­tem and/​or agency (prefer­ably juve­nile court, juve­nile pro­ba­tion or local law enforce­ment) and must engage and col­lab­o­rate with a vari­ety of youth-serv­ing agen­cies and pro­fes­sion­als, includ­ing but not lim­it­ed to pro­ba­tion, youth deten­tion, child wel­fare, pub­lic edu­ca­tion, com­mu­ni­ty-based orga­ni­za­tions, par­ents and fam­i­ly, local law enforce­ment, courts, pub­lic defend­ers and youth and faith-based organizations.
• Part­ners with­in the lead­er­ship group must com­mit to pro­mot­ing RJJ with­in their agen­cies, includ­ing allo­cat­ing time for par­tic­i­pat­ing staff to attend required train­ing activ­i­ties and to deliv­er the train­ing locally.
• Part­ners with­in the lead­er­ship group must agree to con­sid­er pol­i­cy and prac­tice rec­om­men­da­tions iden­ti­fied by par­tic­i­pants as a result of RJJ course mod­ule dis­cus­sions. Lead­er­ship part­ners should com­mit to par­tic­i­pat­ing in the final RJJ mod­ule ses­sion, Trans­form­ing Pol­i­cy and Prac­tice, to hear rec­om­men­da­tions that emerge from the par­tic­i­pat­ing cohort.
• Appli­ca­tions will des­ig­nate a cen­tral point of con­tact and site team leader. The site team leader will be respon­si­ble for over­all local site deliv­ery and project man­age­ment, encour­age full par­tic­i­pa­tion in the RJJ ini­tia­tive and main­tain reg­u­lar com­mu­ni­ca­tion with their lead­er­ship group and SMI.

Authen­tic Youth Engage­ment: Con­sis­tent with RJJ’s mis­sion to instill pos­i­tive youth devel­op­ment prin­ci­ples and scale up efforts to tru­ly trans­form the youth jus­tice sys­tem, RJJ 6.0 empha­sizes the role and engage­ment of young adult lead­ers as design­ers, part­ners and co-train­ers in bring­ing the cur­ricu­lum to life.

RJJ 6.0 seeks young adults com­mit­ted to shar­ing their direct expe­ri­ence, voic­es and per­spec­tives to improve the youth jus­tice sys­tem and who may be inter­est­ed in a career in youth jus­tice or oth­er fields where their direct expe­ri­ence is valued.

There­fore, appli­cants who iden­ti­fy two (2) young adults as part­ners with two (2) adult pro­fes­sion­als to be a team charged with deliv­er­ing RJJ local­ly will be giv­en pref­er­ence in the selec­tion process. The young adults select­ed must be between 18 and 30 years old and have had direct expe­ri­ence in the juve­nile jus­tice sys­tem with­in the last 12 years; direct expe­ri­ence may include juve­nile court adju­di­ca­tion, pro­ba­tion or out-of-home place­ment in a juve­nile deten­tion cen­ter or cor­rec­tion­al facil­i­ty, or as a juve­nile charged in the adult sys­tem. There is no degree require­ment for young adult train­ers; how­ev­er, expe­ri­ence in vol­un­teer­ing, lead­er­ship, advo­ca­cy and/​or com­mu­ni­ty orga­niz­ing or pro­fes­sion­al expe­ri­ence or edu­ca­tion in the youth jus­tice field is ideal.

Appli­cants must ensure that the youth mem­bers will be sup­port­ed through­out the process of becom­ing co-train­ers of RJJ work. Sites select­ed will pro­vide oppor­tu­ni­ties to bring the pro­fes­sion­al and young adult train­ers togeth­er to build rap­port and rela­tion­ship dur­ing the RJJ jour­ney and beyond. Appli­cants should iden­ti­fy how the young adult co-train­ers will be com­pen­sat­ed for their time and com­mit to hav­ing a struc­ture in place that will offer these young adults roles in lead­er­ship and deci­sion making.

Train­ing Invest­ment: RJJ 6.0 seeks appli­cants com­mit­ted to invest­ing in the over­all RJJ pro­fes­sion­al devel­op­ment process and requires the following:

• Appli­cants select pro­fes­sion­al team mem­bers who are knowl­edge­able about adult learn­ing method­olo­gies, embrace the prin­ci­ples of RJJ, can ful­ly com­mit to the RJJ train­ing cal­en­dar and are able to deliv­er the cur­ricu­lum between Octo­ber 2023 and April 2024. Essen­tial to selec­tion is the abil­i­ty of the adult team mem­bers to sup­port and engage their youth coun­ter­parts as equal learn­ers as well as train­ers of RJJ.
• Appli­cants devel­op a sup­port­ed onboard­ing process for pro­fes­sion­al adult and young adult train­ers and ensure they have the time and resources nec­es­sary to: 
  1. learn about the RJJ cur­ricu­lum and core concepts;
  2. meet and devel­op rap­port and rela­tion­ships with one anoth­er pri­or to and fol­low­ing the T4T Insti­tute; and
  3. meet with super­vi­sors and oth­er lead­er­ship group mem­bers as need­ed to dis­cuss progress, prob­lem-solve chal­lenges and obtain feedback.
• Appli­cants ensure that they can equi­tably com­pen­sate team mem­bers — espe­cial­ly young adult mem­bers who are not cur­rent­ly employed or able to secure paid release time from their cur­rent work­place — for time ded­i­cat­ed to required prepa­ra­tion, facil­i­ta­tion train­ing, T4T Insti­tute par­tic­i­pa­tion and local deliv­ery of curriculum.
• pro­gram super­vi­sors com­mit the nec­es­sary time and com­pen­sa­tion for their RJJ teams to: 
  1. par­tic­i­pate in a 60-minute ​“Intro to RJJ” orientation/​preparation ses­sion in July or August 2023 pri­or to the T4T Insti­tute (see cal­en­dar), where they will be intro­duced to their site coach;
  2. attend the in-per­son RJJ T4T Insti­tute tak­ing place in Den­ver, Col­orado, on Sep­tem­ber 12–14, 2023; 
  3. attend vir­tu­al fol­low-ups for a deep­er dive into mod­ule con­tent and local appli­ca­tion, and meet with their site coach to plan delivery;
  4. attend one-hour month­ly vir­tu­al coach­ing ses­sions between Octo­ber 2023 and April 2024;
  5. meet reg­u­lar­ly with one anoth­er to sched­ule and pre­pare for local deliv­ery of the RJJ cur­ricu­lum; and
  6. deliv­er the RJJ course mod­ules local­ly fol­low­ing the T4T Insti­tute in Den­ver and com­plete their first cohort of train­ing pri­or to fall 2024.
• Appli­cants must pro­pose an out­reach and engage­ment strat­e­gy to mar­ket and enroll between 25 and 30 par­tic­i­pants for their first local or state RJJ train­ing cohort. The nation­al team rec­om­mends that par­tic­i­pants rep­re­sent the fol­low­ing: gov­ern­ment, pub­lic and non-prof­it agen­cies; com­mu­ni­ty and faith-based orga­ni­za­tions; youth and fam­i­ly pro­grams; courts and local law enforce­ment; pub­lic edu­ca­tion; and youth with jus­tice sys­tem involve­ment and their par­ents and/​or fam­i­ly members.

Site Inter­view with Staff from SMI and the Casey Foun­da­tion: Pri­or to mov­ing for­ward in the final selec­tion process, co-appli­cants will be asked to par­tic­i­pate in a site inter­view process with rep­re­sen­ta­tives of SMI and the Annie E. Casey Foun­da­tion. Dur­ing this inter­view, co-appli­cants will dis­cuss their vision of results for their par­tic­i­pa­tion in the RJJ T4T Insti­tute, as well as their rela­tion­ship to the work and with each oth­er, their train­ing team selec­tions and their com­mit­ment to ensur­ing young adults have roles in lead­er­ship and deci­sion making.

5. Who should a site select as train­ers to par­tic­i­pate in the RJJ 6.0 Train­ing-for-Train­ers Institute?

A four-per­son train­ing team should ide­al­ly be com­posed of two (2) adult (prefer­ably youth-serv­ing) pro­fes­sion­als and two young adults. We rec­om­mend indi­vid­u­als who:

• rep­re­sent a mix of cul­tur­al, eth­nic and racial back­grounds that reflect the community;
• demon­strate a com­mit­ment to a strong and authen­tic work­ing rela­tion­ship with one anoth­er both pri­or to attend­ing the T4T Insti­tute and in deliv­er­ing the train­ing locally;
• demon­strate the abil­i­ty to cre­ate dynam­ic, inter­ac­tive learn­ing expe­ri­ences that are geared to the adult learner;
• are able to con­nect with oth­ers, share knowl­edge on pos­i­tive youth devel­op­ment with author­i­ty, apply prin­ci­ples pro­mot­ed in the RJJ cur­ricu­lum and exer­cise respect­ful under­stand­ing of their trainees’ per­spec­tives; and
• can com­mit time to the full com­ple­ment of SMI’s vir­tu­al train­ing ses­sions, the T4T Insti­tute, coach­ing, review of mate­ri­als and resources and plan­ning for and deliv­er­ing the RJJ cur­ricu­lum local­ly between Octo­ber 2023 and April 2024.

As not­ed, pref­er­ence will be giv­en to appli­ca­tions that iden­ti­fy a team com­posed of two adult train­ers and two young adult train­ers who have had direct expe­ri­ence in the youth jus­tice sys­tem. How­ev­er, oth­er team con­fig­u­ra­tions may be con­sid­ered based on the site’s demon­strat­ed need and descrip­tion of how youth will be engaged in local delivery.

6. What is the RJJ cur­ricu­lum and how is it delivered?

The RJJ cur­ricu­lum con­sists of six modules:

• Mod­ule 1: Pos­i­tive Youth Devel­op­ment Fundamentals
  Learn about ado­les­cent brain devel­op­ment, how to sup­port a young person’s well-being and how to put pos­i­tive youth devel­op­ment prin­ci­ples into practice.
• Mod­ule 2: Address­ing Race and Eth­nic Equi­ty and Inclu­sion Issues in Pol­i­cy and Practice
  Learn how to iden­ti­fy poli­cies and prac­tices with­in youth-serv­ing sys­tems that are racial­ly and eth­ni­cal­ly dis­crim­i­na­to­ry. Dis­cov­er strate­gies for focus­ing on a young person’s poten­tial and elim­i­nat­ing poli­cies and prac­tices that have a dis­parate effect on youth of color.
• Mod­ule 3: Engag­ing Youth Voice and Empow­er­ing Youth Leadership
  Iden­ti­fy and advo­cate for oppor­tu­ni­ties that posi­tion young peo­ple to be active archi­tects in cre­at­ing their own path­way to success.
• Mod­ule 4: Fos­ter­ing Pos­i­tive Fam­i­ly Rela­tion­ships in the Juve­nile Jus­tice System
  Explore how to estab­lish pos­i­tive, authen­tic and trust­ing rela­tion­ships with the par­ents and fam­i­lies of sys­tem-involved youth. Learn to lever­age fam­i­ly and com­mu­ni­ty ties in ways that rec­og­nize and pro­mote their role in devel­op­ing youth plans.
• Mod­ule 5: Uti­liz­ing a Cross-Sys­tems Approach
  Review how to iden­ti­fy, access and nav­i­gate a diverse spec­trum of youth-serv­ing sys­tems, oppor­tu­ni­ties and resources. Explore lever­ag­ing mutu­al self-inter­est and shared goals to rec­on­cile diver­gent views and rela­tion­ships across these systems.
• Mod­ule 6: Trans­form­ing Pol­i­cy and Prac­tice: Pre­sen­ta­tions and Recommendations
  Dis­cov­er how to exam­ine poli­cies and prac­tices to ensure that juve­nile jus­tice reforms con­tin­ue — and con­tin­ue to sup­port pos­i­tive youth devel­op­ment and a cross-sys­tems approach. Review guid­ance on devel­op­ing rec­om­men­da­tions for lead­er­ship with­in each jurisdiction.

The RJJ cur­ricu­lum is now avail­able online and will be used to sup­port RJJ teach­ing and learn­ing as part of the T4T Insti­tute, as well as in prep and fol­low-up to local train­ing delivery.

There are mul­ti­ple deliv­ery options for the RJJ cur­ricu­lum, including:

• online plat­forms such as Zoom, where mod­ule con­tent can be deliv­ered virtually;
• face-to-face class­room set­ting with time ded­i­cat­ed to cov­er the core con­cepts and prin­ci­ples of each mod­ule; and
• blend­ed or hybrid, which is a com­bi­na­tion of face-to-face class time and online mod­ules. The class time will be for facil­i­tat­ed dis­cus­sion and peer-to-peer interaction.

7. How do I apply to par­tic­i­pate in the RJJ 6.0 Train­ing-for-Train­ers Institute?

Eli­gi­ble appli­cants can apply online using the RJJ 6.0 T4T 2023 Insti­tute Appli­ca­tion. Appli­ca­tions will be accept­ed through 5 p.m. ET on June 2, 2023.

8. What is the cost to par­tic­i­pate in the RJJ institute?

There is no cost to par­tic­i­pate in any of the vir­tu­al train­ing or one-on-one coach­ing ses­sions. How­ev­er, appli­cants must ensure ade­quate com­pen­sa­tion for young adult train­ers on their team who are not employed full time and pro­vide paid, ded­i­cat­ed release time for them to par­tic­i­pate in prepara­to­ry ses­sions, plan and deliv­er local train­ing and par­tic­i­pate in month­ly fol­low-up coach­ing. Proof of cov­er­age will be required.

Costs Spe­cif­ic to Attend­ing the In-Per­son T4T Institute

SMI, through the Annie E. Casey Foun­da­tion, will cov­er the trav­el, lodg­ing and reim­bursable expens­es of two team mem­bers from a select­ed site to attend the in-per­son Den­ver T4T Insti­tute. Appli­cants are respon­si­ble for these costs relat­ed to the atten­dance of the oth­er two team mem­bers, includ­ing one young adult par­tic­i­pant. (Expens­es are esti­mat­ed at $1,000–$1,500 per per­son, depend­ing on trav­el costs to Den­ver.) In addi­tion, SMI will cov­er the cost of a stipend of $525 for one young adult train­er. For teams field­ing two young adult team mem­bers, appli­cants are required to com­pen­sate the sec­ond young adult for their time at the T4T Insti­tute at a rate com­men­su­rate with the SMI stipend ($525).

9. How can I learn more about RJJ before appli­ca­tions are due?

Reg­is­ter here for the RJJ 6.0 T4T infor­ma­tion ses­sion on April 27, 2023, 4–5 p.m. ET. This inter­ac­tive ses­sion will be an oppor­tu­ni­ty to chat direct­ly with the nation­al RJJ team from SMI and the Casey Foun­da­tion along with sev­er­al expe­ri­enced train­ers from pre­vi­ous RJJ cohorts. Atten­dees will learn more about the over­all RJJ expe­ri­ence, approach to train­ing, lessons learned, pol­i­cy and prac­tice changes that have tak­en root and new oppor­tu­ni­ties that have emerged.

The infor­ma­tion ses­sion will cover:

• a brief his­to­ry of the RJJ mod­el and results from recent implementation;
• an overview of the RJJ 6.0 T4T Institute;
• expec­ta­tions for onboard­ing and sup­port­ing young adults as co-train­ers through­out the process;
• expec­ta­tions for local deliv­ery and imple­men­ta­tion of RJJ in 2023–24;
• how to apply and what to expect if select­ed; and
• fre­quent­ly asked questions.

A sec­ond RJJ infor­ma­tion ses­sion will be offered on May 9, 2023, 4–5 p.m. ET, with expe­ri­enced young lead­ers avail­able to dis­cuss strate­gies for youth engage­ment and empow­er­ment in RJJ as co-design­ers, co-train­ers and par­tic­i­pants in train­ing. May 9 (4–5 p.m. ET): Talk with expe­ri­enced young lead­ers about strate­gies for youth engage­ment and empow­er­ment in RJJ as design­ers, co-train­ers and par­tic­i­pants in train­ing. Reg­is­ter here for ses­sion 2. Both ses­sions will be recorded.

Inter­est­ed appli­cants can also vis­it the RJJ Train­ing-for-Train­ers Insti­tute Infor­ma­tion page on JDAIcon­nect. Not a cur­rent mem­ber of JDAIcon­nect? Fol­low these five easy steps to set up your account. As a mem­ber, you will be able to access addi­tion­al RJJ resources along with an array of news and infor­ma­tion on nation­al and local youth jus­tice sys­tem ini­tia­tives, poli­cies and practices.

1. Vis­it part​ners​.aecf​.org. (You will be redi­rect­ed to the login screen on Casey’s Com­mu­ni­ty Café.)
2. Under login options, click ​“Don’t have an account or need help.”
3. Click ​“Cre­ate Account” and fill in your infor­ma­tion. Click ​“Reg­is­ter” to com­plete the account setup.
4. Once in the Com­mu­ni­ty Café, click on the ​“Add apps” to add JDAIcon­nect to your homepage.
5. Click on the JDAIcon­nect but­ton to enter the community.

10. Key dates for RJJ 6.0 T4T in 2023 

April 19, 2023	Launch of RJJ 6.0 T4T Appli­ca­tion Window Apply here
April 27, 2023 4–5 p.m. ET	First infor­ma­tion ses­sion (reg­is­tra­tion form via Sur­vey Monkey) Pre­pared check­list avail­able for sites to self-assess readi­ness, includ­ing co-appli­cant selec­tion, adult and youth train­er selec­tion, lead­er­ship struc­ture, etc.  Reg­is­ter here
May 9, 2023	Sec­ond information/Q&A session Pan­el dis­cus­sion with expe­ri­enced young lead­ers on the poten­tial role of young peo­ple with direct expe­ri­ence in the youth jus­tice sys­tem as part­ners and co-train­ers in the deliv­ery of RJJ and as val­ued voic­es in lead­er­ship and decision-making.  Reg­is­ter here
June 2, 2023	Appli­ca­tions due
June 7, 2023	Final­ist notification Final­ist teams select­ed and noti­fied of next steps to include the sched­ul­ing of a vir­tu­al team inter­view with staff from SMI and the Casey Foundation
June 12–23, 2023	Site inter­views and final­ist follow-up Inter­views with co-appli­cants and pro­posed train­ing team members
June 28, 2023	Final Selec­tion and site notification
July­–August 2023	Site-by-site out­reach Intro to RJJ nation­al coach­ing team and team prepa­ra­tion for the Den­ver T4T Institute
Sep­tem­ber 12–14, 2023	RJJ 6.0 T4T Insti­tute (The Cur­tis Den­ver by Dou­ble­Tree Hilton, Den­ver, Col­orado) Ses­sions start at 1 p.m. MT on Tues­day, Sep­tem­ber 12 and con­clude at 1 p.m. MT on Thurs­day, Sep­tem­ber 14
Octo­ber 2023–December 2024	Local deliv­ery of RJJ training Access to nation­al peer net­work and month­ly learn­ing com­mu­ni­ty sessions

11. Who can I con­tact for addi­tion­al questions?

Direct all ques­tions to:

• Kathy Fly­nn Wood­land, direc­tor of field ser­vices at SMI, at [email protected]​schoolandmain.​org; or
• Gail D. Mum­ford, senior asso­ciate with the Juve­nile Jus­tice Strat­e­gy Group at the Annie E. Casey Foun­da­tion, at [email protected]​aecf.​org.