The Foundation Open lines of communication among all organizations involved with juvenile offenders are necessary to establish a comprehensive treatment approach for offenders and their families.
Open communication can prevent replication of services or, worse, lack of services.
Juvenile offenders and other high-risk youth encounter many problems that often require responses from numerous agencies. They may also have mandatory education requirements associated with the disposition of probation. Personal and family problems and needs can generate turmoil for youth, who may also become lost in a tangle of bureaucratic agencies that too often share only limited information with each other, resulting in fragmented assistance. Although information about adjudicated youth and their families is usually well documented within the various agencies providing services, seldom does one agency maintain a portfolio documenting the complete range of services that have been and are being provided to the juvenile and the juvenile's family. A prime example of inadequate information sharing is the situation that often arises when a student returns to school after detention or confinement.