Are Wyoming Juvenile Offenders Being Denied Education?

In the two years that Republic Free Choice has been investigating Wyoming's juvenile justice system we have uncovered appalling details within the Wyoming system which juvenile justice advocates and even Wyoming legislators' admit is failed and broken. Even the basic necessity of education for juvenile offenders during incarceration is a frequently overlooked issue.

In 1994 the U.S. Department of Justice's Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention published the results of an eighteen month study on the importance of education for juvenile offenders. The study stressed that juvenile offenders in particular need not only the traditional academic coursework, but innovative teaching methods to stimulate their interest as well as approaches beyond academics. "Addressing juvenile offenders' academic skills without paying equal attention to their social and moral reasoning is futile", the study notes.

The persuasive article discussed special education needs as well as Psychoeducational Programming designed to "enhance offenders' thinking and social skills while ameliorating their academic and vocational deficiencies."

Two of Wyoming's largest juvenile incarceration facilities, the Natrona County Juvenile Detention Center and the Laramie County Juvenile Services Center claim to be addressing the educational needs of their incarcerated youth. A tour of Laramie's Juvenile Services Center earlier this year revealed that the officer in charge of the center, Captain Michael Sorenson, provides his charges with a full time teacher and mandated class attendance during the day with no permitted interruptions except court appearances. According to Capt. Sorenson, his facility is the only one employing a full-time teacher while other facilities simply draft guards and other staff to teach.

Capt. Sorenson also stressed that his policy of not permitting interruptions during academic hours was particularly unpopular with social workers from the Department of Family Services and sometimes even other law enforcement personnel when a juvenile's case is subject to ongoing investigation. Staff members also take it upon themselves to teach basic life skills when not prevented by restrictions, such as the inability to require juveniles to complete community chores, due to stringent interpretation of the child labor laws.

The question remains: Do Wyoming juvenile offenders continue to receive age-appropriate education while incarcerated? There is not a simple answer. At first, juvenile incarceration facilities appear to be attempting to offer age-appropriate education. However, even for the facilities with a dedicated teacher it seems a daunting task to provide adequate education for as many as twenty-four inmates at a time that may range in age from eleven to seventeen.

Beyond the efforts of these two listed facilities, which account for as many as forty-eight incarcerated juveniles per day, the 2013 report from the Wyoming State Advisory Council on Juvenile Justice found, during a spot audit of forty of Wyoming's forty-nine secure adult incarceration facilities, eighty-nine juveniles held in adult jails and prisons; the rest of the nation averages zero.

It is absolutely certain that the juveniles incarcerated in adult facilities are not receiving age-appropriate treatment of any kind let alone education. While the rest of the country practices reformative justice for incarcerated juveniles including life and psychoeducational teaching Wyoming seems unable to even ensure that appropriate academic education is available for all of its youthful offenders.