Indiana Youth Institute 2021 Data Book Executive Summary

The report can be accessed at: 2021 IYI Executive Summary. The 2021 IYI Executive Summary report outlines the urgent need to re-orient youth justice and wellness systems toward equity, prevention, and youth-centered supports, highlighting how current arrest and detention-heavy approaches disproportionately harm marginalized youth and fail to improve long-term outcomes. It presents data showing entrenched disparities by race, disability and gender, underscores the importance of community-based interventions, and calls for investments in developmental assets (such as mentoring, mental-health supports, stable housing, and restorative school practices) and formal pre-arrest diversion options. The summary emphasizes that reducing arrests and system contact not only benefits the individual youth with improved educational, health, and employment trajectories but also strengthens public safety and community well-being. It concludes with a set of key policy and practice recommendations directed at schools, law enforcement, local governments and funders, urging measurable accountability, reinvestment of savings into youth supports, and meaningful engagement of affected youth and families in the design of solutions.