Teen Legal Advocacy Clinic (TLAC) at Center for Children's Advocacy

Complex issues with a legal component often keep teenagers from taking full advantage of the educational opportunities available to them.

Teens may be dealing with abusive parents, homelessness, special education needs, or immigration issues. They might be teen parents and need financial assistance so they can finish high school, or be living in a shelter without transportation to school.

The Center for Children's Advocacy established the Teen Legal Advocacy Clinic (TLAC) in 1998. The first office was on site at Hartford Public High School, making it one of six school-based legal services programs in the country at that time. After more than ten years, the TLAC expanded to provide legal services to youth in all Hartford schools. In 2007, the TLAC opened on site at Harding High School in Bridgeport, and in 2010 the TLAC began work with Stamford students.

Attorneys with the Center’s Teen Legal Clinics also bring services and support directly to youth who live in shelters throughout the state, and to youth involved with other community agencies

Our attorneys provide legal advice and representation to teens to help them solve the crises in their lives that cause them to drop out of school. Publications on these issues are linked below. The types of cases and questions include:

Individual cases expose systemic issues. Through administrative and legislative advocacy, our attorneys promote changes to policies and practices that will benefit the largest number of teens, including:

The Teen Legal Advocacy Clinic provides trainings for teens and for professionals working with teens throughout the state.

Trainings for teens help youth understand their legal rights and know how to advocate for themselves when issues arise. These trainings often include education on legal issues and the contacts in agencies who can help teens resolve their legal problems.

Professional trainings help attorneys, child advocates and agency or placement personnel who work with teens recognize and respond appropriately to legal issues affecting teens. Training topics include statutory rape, the legal rights of teens in foster care, the legal rights of teens in group placements, teens' access to state and federal benefits, the educational rights of homeless children and youth, and immigration laws affecting teens.

Publications and Links on Teen Legal Topics, including Adolescent Health Care, Benefits and Child Support, Medical Coverage, Detention, Emancipation, Immigration, Pregnant and Parenting Teens, Runaway and Homeless Youth, Education, Teen Dating Violence, Rights in DCF Care.

Stories from the TLAC
Names and descriptive information have been changed to preserve our client's confidentiality.

Baya, born in Nigeria, lost her mother when she was only six months old.
Baya was cared for by her maternal grandmother, but when she was eight, her grandmother died and her father, whom she had never met, arranged to bring her to his home in the U.S. Within a short time, both her father and stepmother were physically abusing Baya. Following custom, other members of the Nigerian community intervened and assumed Baya's care. Baya's father turned over her documents and ceased all support and contact with her.

Baya always assumed that there was no way she could get legal status in this country and never sought any assistance to address the matter. She became an exceptional student, earning money during high school by winning writing competitions, becoming valedictorian of her class, and receiving a full private scholarship to a prestigious university.

Just before her 18th birthday, Baya mentioned her situation to someone in the international student office at her university, who referred her to the United States Commission on Refugees and Immigrants (USCRI). The USCRI thought she might qualify for Special Immigrant Juvenile (SIJ) status and referred her to the Center for Children's Advocacy.

The Center determined that Baya clearly qualified for commitment to DCF, a prerequisite for SIJ status (which leads to green card). Although she had been functionally adopted by another couple, she was never legally adopted, and she was inarguably abused and abandoned by her only living legal guardian. Although Baya had a full college scholarship, she had no money for clothes, no housing outside of the school year or during holidays, and was subject to constant risk of deportation to a country where she knows no one.

immediately filed a neglect petition in juvenile court and got a hearing date. (Under Connecticut law, children can only be committed to DCF before they turn 18, but once committed can remain voluntarily in DCF care provided they are in college. Because federal immigration law deems children minors until they turn 21, this leaves a three-year window for SIJ petitions.)

In conversations prior to the hearing, DCF said they would oppose Baya's commitment because she was too close to her 18th birthday, because she had not really been neglected, and because she was doing too well on her own to need the Department's help. None of these arguments has any basis in law..

The Center's legal advocacy means that Baya will receive DCF support until she graduates, and she can now file for Special Immigrant Juvenile Status and become a Lawful Permanent Resident of the United States.

As a mentally challenged 18 year old with little family or community support, Shantel needed legal advocacy in several different areas. She needed assistance to appeal a denial of Supplemental Security Income, and assistance in accessing services from the Connecticut Department of Developmental Services. We advocated for her right to educational stability as a homeless student under the federal McKinney-Vento Homeless Assistance Act.

Faced with her disability and the debilitating effects of domestic violence, Shantel's life was in crisis when we met her. She did not know how to navigate the state bureaucracy to exercize her legal rights and get access to needed services. She was moving from shelter to shelter on a frequent basis, which made it difficult for her to manage her day-to-day living.

Through the Center's aggressive advocacy, Shantel was able to remain at Hartford Public High School and receive transportation to and from school while she moved from shelter to shelter. We successfully advocated for an appropriate vocational educational program by filing for a hearing at the State Department of Education.

We navigated her stalled application for cash benefits from the Department of Social Services, and secured the reversal of an improper denial of assistance from the Social Security Administration to ensure that Shantel's disability-based entitlement to cash assistance is met.

Tamara was referred to the Center by a social worker at Hartford Public High School who knew she had been living in a DCF temporary shelter for four months. The social worker was very concerned that Tamara was going to run away because she had been waiting so long for an appropriate placement. Conditions in the shelter were untenable, and her DCF worker was not responsive.

Because of the Center's experience with other youth who had overstayed in DCF shelters, we were aware that shelter stays were intended to be no more than 45 days. The Center worked closely with DCF to make them aware of Tamara's length of stay, and to monitor efforts being made to find an appropriate placement.

We worked with Tamara's court-appointed lawyer to provide assistance on matters including conditions at the shelter and the enforcement of Tamara's right to educational stability under the federal McKinney-Vento Homeless Assistance Act.

Individual cases often expose systemic issues. The Center proposed legislation to address the problem of overstays in youth emergency placements on a statewide level. We wrote a bill limit the length of stay, provide court oversight when overstays occurred, and create a task force to study the problem.

Tamara herself testified at the hearing saying, "It wasn't my fault that I had to live in a shelter, so I didn't understand why people were treating me this way." The legislation raised awareness of the plight of youth such as Tamara and the need for further reform.

Center Attorneys Advocate to Stop "Pushout" of Bridgeport Students into Inappropriate Alternative Education Programs

Alternative school programs can be an appropriate option for students who prefer to complete their education in a non-traditional setting. But for many students, Bridgeport schools have violated state law by dictating alternative placements without presenting available options to the student and his/her family.

Connecticut law requires that a PPT (Planning and Placement Team meeting) occur before a student's placement is determined. Working with several teen clients in Bridgeport, attorneys from the Center's Teen Legal Advocacy Clinic learned that students were routinely being placed in alternative programs without the required PPT.

teengirlpurpshirt For Jessica, a Harding High School special education student, the school mandated her transfer to the District's Alternative Day program. Jessica's mother was called by a school administrator and informed of the school's decision. Although she asked for a PPT - and was told that one would be scheduled - six weeks went by before Jessica's mother was able to gain adequate information about her child's new placement in the Alternative Day program.

There are three alternative school programs for Bridgeport teens. In each of these programs, major issues expressed by parents and students include:

placement of special education students without the required placement PPT
lack of PPTs for students for whom a referral is required by law pursuant to unsatisfactory academic progress, behavior, or attendance
lack of access to the regular high school curriculum
frustration regarding the overall classroom climate in alternative programs

CCA's past collaborative relationship with Bridgeport Assistant Superintendent John DiDonato on similar issues, addressed in the fall of 2009, led to changes at that time and was helpful in addressing concerns promptly.

After a series of meetings between CCA attorneys, District administrators and the Principals of the Bridgeport high schools, measures were taken to remedy due process concerns for special education students, questions regarding the number of hours students were in school, and classroom climate concerns. The group will meet again in the fall to discuss the District's plan to move forward with these programs as a viable and legally appropriate option for students in the coming school year.

For more information about this initiative, please contact Center for Children's Advocacy TLAC attorney Stacey Violante Cote at sviolant@kidscounsel.org.

Stacey Violante Cote, Esq.
Director, Teen Legal Advocacy Clinic
Center for Children's Advocacy, Inc.
sviolant@kidscounsel.org
(860) 570-5327

Edwin Colon, Esq.
Staff Attorney, Teen Legal Advocacy Clinic
Center for Children's Advocacy
ecolon@kidscounsel.org
(203) 223-8975