“Court-involved” students — those who are incarcerated, on probation, in foster care, in residential treatment facilities, or have concurrent adjudications — retain their full educational rights under federal and state laws. They also face many educational challenges, as they are often highly mobile, have concentrated needs, and may have missed significant stretches of school. Providing high-quality experiences for these students requires schools and juvenile facilities to quickly transfer records like transcripts, attendance, assessments, and special education plans as students move between placements.
In Nebraska — as in many states — systems for sharing these critical education records of court-involved students have been inefficient and ineffective for many years. But progress is possible.
Transforming Education Data Sharing for Nebraska’s Court-Involved Students: Improving Academic Outcomes Through Cross-Agency Collaboration details Bellwether’s nine-month effort supporting a team of state leaders from Nebraska’s youth-serving agencies in creating a recommendation and implementation plan to centralize and improve education data-sharing functions.
As a result of this partnership, on March 11, 2025, Gov. Jim Pillen signed into law LB 296, requiring the NDE to create a centralized education records service for students under the jurisdiction of the juvenile court. This legislative success can provide a model for other states working to improve coordination between agencies.
