Community Justice System

Yesterday, I attended the orientation for volunteers in the Juvenile detention center. During the workshop, the volunteer coordinator described the center as a place to hold youth for the community. This struck a chord with me. I did not have an image of jail, where the people there had done something wrong and needed to repay their debt. (an assumption I held in my younger years) My image changed to a holding place for youth to contemplate and restructure themselves so that they may return to the community. I clearly see my role in the system to support youth in gaining key life-skills to be productive community members. This, of course, means we must examine the communities to which these youth return. How are we creating places to affirm their new skills and allow them to grow. Our society, as a whole, is failing on this level and I am here to make a change in that system.

This is by no means the end of my thoughts, just the beginning of the justice system and its relationship to communitysteading.