Combating the Cradle to Prison Pipeline

Action: Find out about this campaign and how you can participate

Background:
1 in 3: That’s the chance that an African American boy born in 2001 will go to prison in his lifetime
1 in 7: That’s the odds for a Latino boy

Black and Latina girls also have a much higher chance of going to prison than white girls.Children of color, says the Children’s Defense Fund (CDF), are caught in a Cradle to Prison Pipeline, caused by
* Poverty
* Racial disparities
* A culture of punishment rather than prevention and early intervention.

As part of its national campaign to dismantle this Cradle to Prison Pipeline, CDF held a two-day “National/California Summit.” The first day, young people from around the country discussed ways they could act against this pipeline. The second day the youth were joined by adults from all over California sharing ideas and promising practices.

Summit chair Angela Glover Blackwell, executive director of PolicyLink, declared the mass incarceration of people of color “the biggest scandal since slavery.” Connie Rice of the Advancement Project quoted an Oakland youth who told her, “This jail s*** is our Jim Crow.” And NAACP President Benjamin Jealous told the crowd, “It’s movement time again.”

For more information including facts on the Cradle to Prison Pipeline in California: www.childrensdefense.org/helping-americas-children/cradle-to-prison-pipeline-campaign/

For information on the campaign in California: Children’s Defense Fund California, 510-663-3224, 213-355-8787, http://www.cdfca.org/

Read more news like this in the Jul-Aug Children's Advocates Roundtable report from the Children's Advocate, http://www.4children.org/issues/2009/july_august/
childrens_advocate_roundtable/
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