The Juvenile Justice System: Which Risk Assessments are Right for Girls?

Curious about whether the risk assessments used in the juvenile justice system are appropriate for girls? Wonder if the one used in your jurisdiction measures up?
The Girls Study Group, set up by The Office of Juvenile Delinquency and Delinquency Prevention (OJJDP), recently examined 143 juvenile risk assessment instruments with those very questions in mind, and compiled their results in an online database.
This is timely, given that a recent study by the National Council on Crime and Delinquency indicated that risk assessments have gotten less effective in recent years, and an article in a journal last year that argued that juvenile risk assessments lagged behind research on how best to use them. (Photo by Thuy Pham.)