CRJ 253 - Introduction to Juvenile Justice

3 Credit Hours

This course is designed to give students a comprehensive overview of juvenile offending and delinquency theories. The course will examine the history of the juvenile justice system, and evaluate the latest available statistics on juvenile crime and victimization, drug use, court processing, corrections, and how juvenile delinquency has been constructed as a social problem. The course will also examine case studies of juvenile court processes and the juvenile prison system to analyze the possible influence of biosocial factors on delinquency such as social media, cyber bullying, status offenses, drug legalization; police shootings, and specialty courts for teens with mental illness.