Updates + Events

34th Canadian Congress on Criminal Justice
October 2, 2013

PLEA sits on the steering committee that is planning the 34th Canadian Congress on Criminal Justice which will be held from October 2nd-5th, 2013 in Vancouver at the Hyatt Regency Hotel. The theme of Congress is 21st Century Justice: The Economics of Public Safety. Congress brings together justice system professionals to network and gain valuable information on current knowledge and debates in the justice system. The Honourable Justice Ted Hughes will chair the event. There are several excellent speakers on the agenda for Congress including: The Honourable Wally Oppal-missing women’s inquiry; Dr. Steve Aos- evidence-based investments in services in Washington State; Michael Chettleburgh- street gangs; Catherine Latimer- costs of prison overcrowding; Kim Pate and Howard Sapers- deaths in custody; Christopher J. Koegl- the economic impact of targeting early risk factors; PLEA and McCreary- evaluation of PLEA’s youth justice programs and many more.
The Congress program and registration information is available at the following link: http://www.ccja-acjp.ca/cong2013/program2013.pdf.

PLEA has the lead for developing youth related content for the Congress program. As part of this responsibility PLEA, the John Howard Society of the Lower Mainland and PARCA are hosting two youth specific pre-conference activities at the Hyatt Regency Hotel:

1. The first meeting of the proposed national youth justice network- Wednesday October 2nd , 10am-3pm (free):
Executive Directors, Directors and Management level Public Servants are invited to attend the inaugural meeting of a proposed Canadian National Youth Justice Network. The Network’s purpose is to bring together leaders from government and community and residential agencies in the youth justice sector from across Canada to meet to discuss current youth justice issues, create opportunities for national collaboration and to share knowledge about best and promising practices in their areas which can be utilized to benefit the practice of those in other jurisdictions.

2. A learning session with Dr. Martin Brokenleg on the Circle of Courage model Wednesday October 2nd, 9:30am-4:00pm (free to those from outside of BC; $100 fee for those from in the province).
The Circle of Courage: For thousands of years, American Indian cultures nourished respectful and courageous children without employing punitive discipline. Now, recent youth development research is revealing the essential elements in raising confident, caring children. Drawing on his research with Drs. Larry Brendtro and Steve Van Bockern in their book, Reclaiming Youth at Risk, Dr. Martin Brokenleg presents "The Circle of Courage" which offers concrete strategies for creating environments in which all young people can grow and flourish.

For those interested in registering for either of the youth specific events please send an email to parca@plea.bc.ca to register. Please note that space is limited for both events so register early!

More information about Congress and pre-Congress events is available on the Canadian Criminal Justice website at: http://www.ccja-acjp.ca/en/.

Vancity provides a $15,000 community grant to U-Turn to help prepare youth for independent living
May 14, 2013

PLEA’s U-Turn program received $15,000 from Vancity, with the funds going towards a six week job placement, intensive one-to-one support, supervision, and employer mentoring with a variety of training and educational opportunities.
U-Turn assists youth aged 14-18 years who are facing significant life challenges.
Thanks to Vancity providing wage subsidies, young people will be given the opportunity to benefit from job mentoring so they can gain employment and life skills, create community connections and learn about financial management. This is vital in the transition to independence.
Thank you Vancity!

First Call published its research report, Child Labour is No Accident: The Experience of BC’s Working Children
May 10, 2013

You will find a copy of the report on their website here, as well as the media release and additional materials. On the eve of publishing the report, they received important new data from WorkSafe BC. Since it was too late to integrate this new data into the report, they have included it as an addendum.
First Call has given multiple interviews over the past two days:

*Both these articles are in the print version of the Vancouver Sun today

This has been a project that they wanted to do for a long time, and its shocking findings have justified our concern about the impact of the deregulation of child labour in BC in 2003.

We would appreciate it if you could share the report with your networks, to help us create the momentum needed to ensure that the problems highlighted by this report receive the attention they deserve, and result in concrete policy changes.

KidStart Sun Run Team Raises $7,300!
April 24, 2013

In recognition of National Volunteer Week, we would like to acknowledge the amazing KidStart Volunteer Mentors, PLEA staff, car2go members and car2go staff who all volunteered their time to raise pledges and run on behalf of the KidStart Mentoring Program in the 2013 Vancouver Sun Run. We have a few last minute donations coming in but we are thrilled to announce that to date we raised over $7300 for KidStart!

A big thank you to everyone who donated to the KidStart Sun Run Team, helped build the team, followed our posts on Facebook and Twitter and cheered us on. Car2go raised over $2400 in their office for us and our runners matched that with their pledge raising.

It was a big team effort to get us to our goal so if you see a team member give them a ‘high five’!

We will be processing eligible tax receipts over the next 2 weeks…thank you for your patience!

Thank you KidStart volunteers!
April 21, 2013

It is National Volunteer Week and we want to take this time to say thank you to all of our volunteers!