Young Leaders Take the Next Step to Break Down the Prison Pipeline in California

During the weekend of October 2-4, 2009, 38 young adult advocates from all across California, participated in the second of the three part California Cradle to Prison Pipeline® Young Leaders Training series sponsored by The California Endowment. The California young leaders joined more than 100 young leaders from around the country at the national Young Advocate Leadership Training or YALT® program held at CDF’s Haley Farm in Clinton, Tennessee.

The young leaders from California took the next step in their advocacy education, met fellow advocates and activists, and increase their knowledge on California’s prison pipeline and the series of feeder systems and issues that push tens of thousands of youths into incarceration. Participants experienced an Underground Railroad Simulation, an activity in realizing their capacities to dismantle the prison pipeline. Participants developed regional goals and action plans which the young leaders will begin to implement this year. Some examples of these regional plans included working to get the Youth PROMISE Act passed, working to ensure that the 2010-11 California state budget does not cut children’s programs and services, and becoming restorative justice trained mediators. These and other exciting plans to dismantle the California prison pipeline are works in progress that began during part one of the training series in September 2009.

This training series is the continuation of the CDF-CA Cradle to Prison Pipeline Campaign which was launched in February 2009 with the National/California Cradle to Prison Pipeline Summit. The final part of this three-part training series will be held at the end of January 2010 in California. For more information or to find out how you can support the California Cradle to Prison Pipeline Young Leaders Training series, contact CDF-CA’s Field Director Nina Moreno.

CDF's vision is to develop the next generation of leaders: young people who are committed to social justice and the welfare of all children. 

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