In Partnership With The GIANT Company
Social Justice Institute
As part of our ongoing efforts to address inequalities, PA CASA is excited to announce the kickoff of The Social Justice Institute with The GIANT Company as the founding partner. This partnership will allow PA CASA to advance the existing DEI committee’s efforts to date. It will enable the state office to work individually and in groups with local CASA programs targeting areas for enhanced work that addresses social justice issues that directly impact service to children and families.
The Social Justice Institute is designing a strategic, comprehensive timeline to make new investments and commitments to diversity, equity, inclusion, and belongingness. Our efforts to address social justice issues in communities include: maintaining a collection of core documents, reviewing policies and procedures for inclusive language, collecting and analyzing data to address disproportionality in board, staff, and volunteers, and examining disparate outcomes for children served through the use of Optima reports and qualitative surveys. The Social Justice institute will also develop a DEI plan and focus on the recruitment of a diverse board, staff, and volunteers reflective of the communities they serve through intentional recruitment plans. PA CASA will offer training opportunities and different initiatives such as the Health Equity course which will focus on addressing racial, ethnic, and LGBTQ+ health disparities.
PA CASA is dedicated to producing better outcomes for children and families and addressing the disparities in the child welfare system. This means creating a culture of continuous learning and improvement, where our programs, staff, and partners reflect and address the needs of the diverse communities and children we serve.
PA CASA is excited to create an open and inclusive space where programs can have authentic conversations and voice their thoughts and ideas.
In Partnership With The Giant Company
Social Justice Institute
As part of our ongoing efforts to address inequalities, PA CASA is excited to announce the kickoff of The Social Justice Institute with The GIANT Company as the founding partner. This partnership will allow PA CASA to advance the existing DEI committee’s efforts to date. It will enable the state office to work individually and in groups with local CASA programs targeting areas for enhanced work that addresses social justice issues that directly impact service to children and families.
The Social Justice Institute is designing a strategic, comprehensive timeline to make new investments and commitments to diversity, equity, inclusion, and belongingness. Our efforts to address social justice issues in communities include: maintaining a collection of core documents, reviewing policies and procedures for inclusive language, collecting and analyzing data to address disproportionality in board, staff, and volunteers, and examining disparate outcomes for children served through the use of Optima reports and qualitative surveys. The Social Justice institute will also develop a DEI plan and focus on the recruitment of a diverse board, staff, and volunteers reflective of the communities they serve through intentional recruitment plans. PA CASA will offer training opportunities and different initiatives such as the Health Equity course which will focus on addressing racial, ethnic, and LGBTQ+ health disparities.
PA CASA is dedicated to producing better outcomes for children and families and addressing the disparities in the child welfare system. This means creating a culture of continuous learning and improvement, where our programs, staff, and partners reflect and address the needs of the diverse communities and children we serve.
PA CASA is excited to create an open and inclusive space where programs can have authentic conversations and voice their thoughts and ideas.
Pennsylvania CASA Association’s values are founded in the belief that best-interest volunteer advocacy can ensure safety, well-being, and permanency for abused and neglected children. We live our values by:
- Communicating with accuracy, integrity, and truthfulness
- Creating a community of respect, without judgment
- Listening to communities and programs to build understanding
- Integrating the values of individual communities into our work
- Intentionally setting goals
- Focusing on solutions
- Collaborating with local CASA programs and stakeholders and persevering to achieve our goals
Upcoming Events
- PA CASA Book Club
Fall 2022
My Grandmother's Hands: Racialized Trauma and the Pathway to Mending Our Hearts and Bodies - LGBTQ+ Equity and Awareness Training
October 27, 1-4 p.m.
Hybrid Training
Social Justice Institute Initiatives
Leadership Commitment
The Social Justice Institute is committed to supporting local programs, providing resources, and building a culture that is inclusive and innovative.
Employee and Volunteer Experience
The Social Justice Institute will create a work environment where everyone's thoughts, ideas, and perspective matter to expand opportunities for continued learning.
Transparency
The Social Justice Institute will collect and analyze data to inform our understanding of disproportionality and disparities in the dependency system and its impact in the communities we serve.
Workplace Diversity
The Social Justice Institute will take action to diversify volunteers, staff, and board members by identifying Black-, Latinx- and Indigenous-owned businesses to become involved with CASA as a volunteer, staff member, or board member.
Effective Learning and Development
The Social Justice Institute will provide educational opportunities and resources to create a culture of continuous learning and improvement, where our programs, staff, and partners reflect and address the needs of the diverse communities and children we serve.
Implement and Advocate
The Social Justice Institute will work with local programs to establish and implement diversity, equity, and inclusion plans reflective of these values to promote a more equitable and inclusive environment and seek to take action to address disparities.
Resources
I Am Enough
Grace Byers
This gorgeous, lyrical ode to loving who you are, respecting others, and
being kind to one another comes from Empire actor and activist Grace
Byers and talented newcomer artist Keturah A. Bobo. We are all here for a purpose. We are more than enough. We just need to believe it.
Age Range: 3-7 years
Just Ask!: Be Different, Be Brave, Be You
Sonia Sotomayor & Rafael López
In Just Ask, United States Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor celebrates the different abilities kids (and people of all ages) have. Using her own experience as a child who was diagnosed with diabetes, Justice Sotomayor writes about children with all sorts of challenges--and looks at the special powers those kids have as well. As the kids work together to build a community garden, asking questions of each other along the way, this book encourages readers to do the same: When we come across someone who is different from us but we're not sure why, all we have to do is Just Ask.
Age Range: 4-7 years
New Kid
Jerry Kraft
Seventh grader Jordan Banks loves nothing more than drawing cartoons about his life. But instead of sending him to the art school of his dreams, his parents enroll him in a prestigious private school known for its academics, where Jordan is one of the few kids of color in his entire grade.
Age Range: 9-12 years
From the Desk of Zoe Washington
Janae Marks
Zoe Washington isn’t sure what to write. What does a girl say to the father she’s never met, hadn’t heard from until his letter arrived on her twelfth birthday, and who’s been in prison for a terrible crime? A crime he says he never committed. Could Marcus really be innocent? Zoe is determined to uncover the truth. Even if it means hiding his letters and her investigation from the rest of her family. Everyone else thinks Zoe’s worrying about doing a good job at her bakery internship and proving to her parents that she’s worthy of auditioning for Food Network’s Kids Bake Challenge.
Age Range: 11+ years
Hey, Kiddo: A Graphic Novel
Jarrett J. Krosoczka
Hey, Kiddo is a profoundly important memoir about growing up in a family grappling with addiction and finding the art that helps you survive.
Age Range: 11+ years
Same But Different
RJ Peete, Holly Robinson Peete, Ryan Peete
Same But Different explores the funny, painful, and unexpected aspects of teen autism, while daring to address issues nobody talks about. Same But Different underscores tolerance, love, and the understanding that everybody's unique drumbeat is worth dancing to.
Age Range: 12+ years
All American Boys
Jason Reynolds, Brendan Kiely
In this Coretta Scott King Honor Award-winning novel, two teens—one black, one white—grapple with the repercussions of a single violent act that leaves their school, their community, and, ultimately, the country bitterly divided by racial tension.
Age Range: 12+ years
Far from the Tree
Robin Benway
This is a story that is told in the voices of three characters, all siblings who were separated at a young age and placed in foster care. Now, as teenagers, they find each other and must find a way to connect while also dealing with the foster and adoptive families they’ve grown up with.
Age Range: 13 - 17 years
Clap When You Land
Elizabeth Acevedo
In a novel-in-verse, that brims with grief and love, National Book Award-winning and New York Times bestselling author Elizabeth Acevedo writes about the devastation of loss, the difficulty of forgiveness, and the bittersweet bonds that shape our lives.
Age Range: 14+ years
Dear Martin
Nic Stone
Justyce McAllister is a good kid, an honor student, and always there to help a friend—but none of that matters to the police officer who just put him in handcuffs. Despite leaving his rough neighborhood behind, he can't escape the scorn of his former peers or the ridicule of his new classmates.
Age Range: 14+ years
The Black Kids
Christina Hammonds Reed
This novel is perfect for young adult readers exploring issues of race, diversity, class, and violence through the eyes of a wealthy black teenager whose family gets caught in the vortex of the 1992 Rodney King Riots.
Age Range: 14+ years
You Should See Me in A Crown
Leah Johnson
Liz Lighty has always believed she's too black, too poor, and too awkward to shine in her small, rich, prom-obsessed midwestern town. Liz has a plan to get her out of the town to study to become a doctor. But when her financial aid doesn’t come through she has to try to win her school’s prom queen race to get a scholarship.
Age Range: 12-18 years
It Didn’t Start With You
Mark Wolynn
This book explains how inherited family trauma shapes who we are and how to end the cycle. It provides a transformative approach to resolving longstanding difficulties that in many cases, traditional therapy, drugs, or other interventions have not had the capacity to touch.
Hunger: A Memoir of (My) Body
Roxanne Gay
In Hunger, Roxanne Gay explores her past—including the devastating act of violence that acted as a turning point in her young life—and brings readers along on her journey to understand and ultimately save herself.
The Body Keeps the Score: Brain, Mind, and Body in the Healing of Trauma
Bessel van der Kolk M.D.
The Body Keeps the Score uses recent scientific advances to show how trauma literally reshapes both body and brain, compromising sufferers’ capacities for pleasure, engagement, self-control, and trust. He explores innovative treatments—from neurofeedback and meditation to sports, drama, and yoga—that offer new paths to recovery by activating the brain’s natural neuroplasticity.
Blindspot: Hidden Biases of Good People
Mahzarin R. R. Banaji & Anthony G. Greenwald
“Blindspot” is the authors’ metaphor for the portion of the mind that houses hidden biases. Writing with simplicity and verve, Banaji and Greenwald question the extent to which our perceptions of social groups—without our awareness or conscious control—shape our likes and dislikes and our judgments about people’s character, abilities, and potential.
Just Mercy: A Story of Justice and Redemption
Bryan Stevenson
A powerful true story about the potential for mercy to redeem us, and a clarion call to fix our broken system of justice—from one of the most brilliant and influential lawyers of our time.
How to Be an Antiracist
Ibram X. Kendi
Kendi takes readers through a widening circle of antiracist ideas—from the most basic concepts to visionary possibilities—that will help readers see all forms of racism clearly, understand their poisonous consequences, and work to oppose them in our systems and in ourselves.
Videos
- Jessica Pryce | To Transform Child Welfare, Take Race Out of the Equation
Podcasts
- One in Ten presented by National Children’s Alliance - CEO and podcast enthusiast Teresa Huizar wanted to bring a go-to resource for professionals with access to the brightest minds with insights in trying to deal with the problem of child abuse.
- Seen out Loud Podcast - A show about disrupting the child welfare system by the simple act of seeing families in their full humanity. Each episode brings voices of lived expertise and industry disruptors to the mic where they share honest insights and raw stories to compel us to take action in transformational change.
- Unbelievably Resilient - Empowers current and former foster youth to reclaim their narratives by authentically sharing their journeys, as alumni of foster care, and moving from trauma to triumph.
Human Rights Campaign
The Human Rights Campaign and the Human Rights Campaign Foundation together serve as America's largest civil rights organization working to achieve LGBTQ equality. By inspiring and engaging individuals and communities, HRC strives to end discrimination against LGBTQ people and realize a world that achieves fundamental fairness and equality for all.
At the Intersection: Race, Sexuality and Gender
A report on a study to better understand what's important to LGBTQ people of color. Read the full report here.
LGBTQ Youth in the Foster Care System
"Many LGBTQ youth have the added layer of trauma that comes with being rejected or mistreated because of their sexual orientation, gender identity or gender expression." Read the full report here.
The Trevor Project
To end suicide among gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender, queer & questioning young people.
A Guide To Being An Ally To Transgender And Nonbinary Youth
The Trevor Project has published this guide to help begin your education on the basics of gender identity and expression. You'll be able to better support the trans and nonbinary folks in your lives, and help to create a safer, kinder and more accepting world. The "Guide to Being an Ally to Transgender and Nonbinary Youth" is an introductory educational resource that covers a wide range of topics and best practices on how to support transgender and nonbinary people.
Center for Community Resources provides services in all 67 counties of PA. Check the county listing for the services available in your area.
Center for Community Resources assures equal opportunities for all individuals regardless of age, sex, race, color, religion, ancestry, national origin, disability, veteran status, sexual orientation, genetic information, limited English proficiency, and any other class of individuals protected from discrimination under state or federal law.
Eastern PA Trans Equity Project provides Direct Services To Transgender And Gender-Diverse Pennsylvanians In A Sixteen County Region In Eastern PA.
Southwestern PA
PRISM of Beaver County
Beaver, PA
PRISM (Pride. Respect. Inspiration. Safety. Mentoring.) is a non-profit outreach organization for the LGBTQ+ youth of Beaver County and surrounding counties. Our intention is to be a safe and supportive place for the LGBTQ+, friends, families, and allies of the local community. A space online, and in person, to address the issues, challenges, and triumphs of local LGBTQ+ youth. PRISM has one monthly meeting in Beaver (at NAMI of Beaver County), and usually one outing each month.
Dreams of Hope
Pittsburgh, PA
Dreams of Hope (DOH) has established itself as Pittsburgh’s only arts-focused, lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and allied (LGBTA) youth (13-21) organization.
Project Silk
Pittsburgh, PA
Project SILK provides a safe, healthy, supportive community environment for LGBT youth of color to grow, celebrate, and express themselves. With service providers and community partners, we advocate for our youth to determine the meaning and direction of their own lives. Project Silk is an HIV prevention and care initiative geared toward our priority community, black and Latinx young (13-29 years) gay men and transgender individuals of color in the Pittsburgh region. Project Silk drop-in hours are Monday through Thursday from 1-8 p.m.
Sexuality and Gender Alliance
Washington, PA
The Washington County Gay Straight Alliance, Inc. has facilitated and provided resources for a peer group of Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, Transsexual, Questioning, Queer, Asexual, and Allied (LGBTQA) youth since November 2005. The WCGSA formed a Nonprofit Corporation in August 2012, to expand programming and services.
Southeastern PA
Project SILK – Lehigh Valley – Bradbury-Sullivan LGBT Center
Allentown, PA
Project SILK Lehigh Valley creates a brave space for LGBT youth of color and their social networks to be themselves. Project SILK Lehigh Valley provides daily, professionally-staffed youth programs for LGBT youth ages 14-21, builds leadership among LGBT youth and provides HIV interventions to empower youth to be their own healthcare advocates. As a youth empowerment program, Project SILK Lehigh Valley develops youth leadership within the program. Program participants have a clear voice in determining the direction of the program. Project SILK Lehigh Valley is open Tuesdays, Wednesdays, and Thursdays from 1-6 p.m. for drop-in hours -- and by appointment on Mondays and Fridays.
Haven – The Unitarian Universalist Church of the Lehigh Valley
Bethlehem, PA
Haven is an open community striving for inclusiveness, valuing individual rights, personal freedoms, and ecological/social responsibilities at both the secular and spiritual levels. Haven Youth Group is one program of UUCLV which provides a safe, supportive environment for gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender questioning youth while providing positive role models and peer support, sponsoring social and recreational activities, and safe weekly meetings for GLBT youth.
The Rainbow Room
Doylestown, PA
Planned Parenthood Keystone’s Rainbow Room is Bucks County’s inclusive, empowering, and brave space for lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, questioning+ youth, and their allies. The Rainbow Room provides a supportive, welcoming, and fun environment for youth between the ages of 14 and 21. Since its inception over 15 years ago, the Rainbow Room has had a critical and affirmative impact on the lives of LGBTQ+ youth, their families, and the Bucks County community as a whole. The Rainbow Room meets in Doylestown on Wednesdays from 6-8 p.m.
The Attic Youth Center
Philadelphia, PA
The Attic is one of the leading LGBTQ Youth Community Centers in the nation. They host a variety of programs, social services, and events that engage hundreds of youth. They provide a diversity of services, so check out their website for more information.
The Spectrum – Planned Parenthood Keystone
Reading, PA
The Spectrum is a safe haven for LGBTQ youth, ages 13-21, in the Greater Reading area. Teens participate in recreational activities, socialize and receive information related to health, sexuality, and life skills. LGBTQ youth face discrimination and increased risk for self-destructive behavior and other challenges. SPECTRUM helps by providing support, camaraderie, and education. The SPECTRUM meets every Wednesday from 5-7 p.m. To find out more call 610-376-0137.
Northeastern PA
The Main Line Youth Alliance
Wayne, PA
The Main Line Youth Alliance (MYA) provides gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender questioning youth and straight allies, with social educational, and supportive activities in a confidential, respectful and safe environment. MYA programs, unique in Philadelphia's western suburbs, encourage healthy relationships with peers, family, and community.
Central PA
Common Roads – The LGBT Community Center Coalition of Central PA
Harrisburg and Lancaster, PA
Common Roads provides education, advocacy, and programming to empower lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and questioning (LGBTQ) youth throughout the Central Pennsylvania region. Common Roads meets every Wednesday in Harrisburg from 6-8 p.m., every Thursday in Carlisle from 6-8 p.m., and every Friday in Lancaster from 7-9:30 p.m. Movies, coffeehouse nights, discussion, arts, field trips – you name it.
Bring Your Own Queer – The Centre LGBTQA Support Network
State College, PA
An LGBTQA+ Youth Group (8th-12th graders) that is co-sponsored by CLSN, CC Youth Service Bureau, and the SC Presbyterian Church. Meetings take place the second Friday of every month 5:30-8 p.m. at the State College Presbyterian Church Fireside Room (132 West Beaver Avenue, State College). Meetings include supper, respect for who you are, great company, and opportunities to share. Additional support groups can be found here.
The Curve
York, PA
The Curve is a support program for lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, and questioning youth and their allies who are between the ages of 14 and 21, and is a safe, supportive, welcoming, and fun environment for advocacy and educational and recreational activities. The Curve meets every Thursday from 5-7 p.m. in Planned Parenthood of Central PA’s York health center.
Participating Programs
Cambria/Somerset CASA - Beginnings, Inc.
Cumberland County CASA
CASA of Fayette County
CASA for Kids, Inc. of Washington County
CASA of Lancaster and Lebanon Counties
CASA of Luzerne County
CASA of Philadelphia County
CASA of McKean County
CASA Youth Advocates (Delaware/Chester)
Participating Programs
Cambria/Somerset CASA - Beginnings, Inc.
Cumberland County CASA
CASA of Fayette County
CASA for Kids, Inc. of Washington County
CASA of Lancaster and Lebanon Counties
CASA of Luzerne County
CASA of Philadelphia County
CASA of McKean County
CASA Youth Advocates (Delaware/Chester)