Children’s Rights is lifting up messages and statistics about the child mental health crisis our nation is facing – and what we need to do about it. Help raise awareness for a police-free crisis response to help children heal in their communities.
In January of 2021 a federal judge in Kansas approved a settlement agreement in the class action lawsuit, M.B. v. Howard, brought on behalf of children in foster care by Children’s Rights and other child welfare advocates, including the National Center for Youth Law, where I first became involved in the case. The lawsuit was filed to […]
Plaintiffs allege the state’s Medicaid program has caused young people with serious mental health conditions to suffer unnecessarily, ending up in hospitals and residential treatment programs because they can’t access vital services.
Mental Health is Health. Health Care is a Basic Human Right. Access to physical and mental health care is vital for children’s healthy development and well-being. It is arguably our most basic human right. Children need access to timely and appropriate home and community-based services to support their physical, cognitive, and emotional development. But every […]
As attorneys collectively representing all immigrant youth in US government custody, we are often asked what it’s like to work with children who arrive in the US fleeing horrific conditions in their home countries. It is humbling work—sometimes traumatic, often painful—but also inspiring and transformational. The words, faces, and stories of the children we have met […]
Ira Lustbader, chief program officer for Children’s Rights, Anne Geraghty Helms, and Julie Gryce of DLA Piper join Dave Scriven-Young from ABA’s Litigation Radio to talk about the need for pro bono legal work and how lawyers and their firms can get involved to make a difference. Learn more about our work, our case in Ohio, and the importance of our pro bono partners in this episode.
This story, Advocates: Ma’Khia Bryant case shows relatives need same resources as other foster parents, was originally published by The Columbus Dispatch. Despite the ongoing threat of the pandemic, families gathered to celebrate the joys of the season. But many kinship caregivers in Ohio struggled to provide children in their care with basic stability and […]
A few years back I was asked by a thoughtful young woman why I never use a pronoun for god. My answer was – and is, because I try to speak about god the way god speaks to us – that god is not a static being, but rather a dynamic, restless force in our […]
Earlier this month the Philadelphia Inquirer reported that The Glen Mills Schools —shut down in 2019 after a child-abuse and cover-up scandal — is seeking to reopen under a new name. This is a school Children’s Rights knows all too well. Several years ago, prompted by ongoing reports of abuse, we conducted our own investigation […]
In a milestone for Milwaukee children in foster care served by Wisconsin’s Department of Children and Families, a federal court has ordered that the agency can exit federal court oversight of a settlement agreement that resulted in major systems change and tangible results for kids. This now closed case is a prime example of how […]
