Community Outreach & Legal Training
Our Community Outreach and Legal Training (COLT) program works to: 1) train court-professionals including judges, social workers, agency staff, and probation officers on how to integrate special education law into the juvenile and criminal court context, and 2) empowers court-involved students with disabilities to advocate for their special education rights.
Legal Trainings
SJP conducts legal training sessions for defense attorneys, judges, and government agencies. Through our training program, our attorneys work to:
increase the number of court-professionals trained on special education in the juvenile and criminal contexts;
increase access to special education legal counsel for indigent defendants ages 18-22; and
empower students to advocate for themselves.
Legal Trainings in Other Jurisdictions
As SJP continues to demonstrate our impact in the nation’s capital, we also have an eye towards national impact. Success in DC can serve as a catalyst for national reform. SJP is not looking to replicate its legal office. Rather, scale involves training and technical assistance with our out-of-District partners on how to integrate special education law into the juvenile and criminal legal contexts. SJP has collaborated with numerous practitioners throughout the country on our Direct Representation and Systemic efforts consulting on issues involving in court representation to helping launch a court education work group focused on education issues for court-involved students with disabilities.
If you are interested in learning more about training opportunities or hosting an Education Legal Desk, please contact us at info@sjpdc.org.