Leave No Child Behind^® mission

The Children’s Defense Fund Leave No Child Behind^® mission is to ensure every child a Healthy Start, a Head Start, a Fair Start, a Safe Start and a Moral Start in life and successful passage to adulthood with the help of caring families and communities.

CDF provides a strong, effective and independent voice for all the children of America who cannot vote, lobby or speak for themselves. We pay particular attention to the needs of poor and minority children and those with disabilities. CDF educates the nation about the needs of children and encourages preventive investments before they get sick, drop out of school, get into trouble or suffer family breakdown. CDF began in 1973 and is a private, nonprofit organization supported by foundation and corporate grants and individual donations. We have never taken government funds.

View a short list of CDF-NY Acomplishments.

June 18, 2009

Announcing 2009 Beat the Odds® Scholarship

We are now accepting applications for our 2009 Beat the Odds® Scholarship. CDF-NY will select four high school students who have overcome tremendous odds to become personally and academically successful and award each of them a $5,000 scholarship for college and public recognition at an event in late fall 2009. Current high school juniors who are on track to graduate by June 2010 are eligible to apply.

This scholarship was developed to celebrate and underscore the positive potential of our nation’s youth.  Tremendous obstacles stand in the way of even the smallest achievements for so many young people, and too seldom do we hear about those who are “beating the odds” despite the daunting conditions in which they live. The multiple challenges overcome by our past winners include family violence, foster care, poverty, hunger, homelessness, and loss of a parent. Yet, these remarkable young people succeeded by graduating from high school and attending college.

Completed application packets are due by 5:00 p.m. on Friday, September 18, 2009. Late applications will not be considered. 

Application

Application Guidelines

May 5, 2009
Register Today: 15th Annual Samuel DeWitt Proctor Institute for Child Advocacy Ministry.
 
Join CDF at the 15th Annual Samuel DeWitt Proctor Institute for Child Advocacy Ministry July 20-24, at CDF Haley Farm in Clinton, Tennessee. Do not miss this transforming week! You will leave renewed and restore and with new ideas about how to step forward for children.

The next generation of religious leaders is invited to step forward and take part in a : special program New Leaders: Joshua & Deborah at the Proctor Institute.   In preparing to continue the mission of building the Blessed Community through the vocations of ministry and child advocacy, this experience will allow the next generation of religious leaders to engage in meaningful dialogue and the exchange of ideas with each other while also gaining the wisdom of the Moses & Miriam Generation.

Apply today for this unique opportunity. All applications must be received by Friday, May 25, 2009.

April 7, 2009
April is Child Abuse Prevention Month 
Child Advocates, Service Providers and Youth Rally to Protect Children

In response to proposed budget cuts to the Administration for Children’s Services (ACS), more than 150 people rallied to call on the Mayor and City Council to restore budget cuts and make sure that ACS and community-based services have the capacity to protect children and keep families together.

Click here for CDF-NY’s testimony on the ACS budget cuts. 

 April 2, 2009

New York State Passes 2009-2010 Budget

The New York State legislature passed the budget negotiated by Governor Paterson, Speaker Sheldon Silver and Majority Leader Malcolm Smith. Click here for CDF-NY's statement on the budget as it relates to children. For more detail on the health budget as it relates to children's access to health insurance, click here.

More than 400 people attended CDF-NY’s February 2009 summit, "Connecting the Neighborhood-based Dots: Promoting Solutions to Dismantle the Pipeline to Prison." The summit focused on public awareness regarding the systemic issues that are driving children from New York’s poorest communities into juvenile detention centers, the need to invest in successful community-based alternatives to detention, and promising solutions and neighborhood-based approaches to dismantling the pipeline.

CDF-NY partnered with the Justice Mapping Center to produce a series of community maps for the summit that dramatically depicted the geographic concentrations of poverty, racial segregation, failing schools, high school suspensions, foster care placement and juvenile detention. Speakers (including youth participants) presented recommendations and solutions to dismantle the pipeline such as creating safe and respectful school cultures and re-directing resources from youth jails to community-based alternatives for young people.

Prior to the event, staff from CDF-NY and the Center for Women's Development at Medgar Evers College conducted eight interactive workshops with different groups of youth (totaling over 100 youth) to generate and prioritize policy recommendations.  The day culminated with a youth panel presenting policy recommendations for dismantling the pipeline. 

CDF-NY plans to use solutions and recommendations from the summit to implement an action plan to dismantle the pipeline in New York.  We hope you will join with us in this important work.  In order to take our next steps, CDF-NY is convening a work group to examine the link between the child welfare and juvenile justice systems and to take concrete steps to keep young people out of these systems. 

If you are interested in becoming involved in this work group, please email Jennifer Marino Rojas, This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it or Mishi Faruqee, This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it .  Also, please email Mishi if you are interested in getting involved in coalitions to promote juvenile justice reform and positive school safety and discipline policies.

Learn more about CDF's Cradle to Prison Pipeline Campaign 

Summit Powerpoint Presentations

Click here for "Youth Panel Policy Recommendations"

Click here for "Framing the Pipeline to Prison"

Click here for "Jobs Not Jail - Reinvestment"

Click here for "East Freedom Connection"

If you have a story to share about how New York’s cradle to prison pipeline has affected you or a member of your family, please contact us at This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it These stories will help us inform agenda as we move to dismantle New York’s pipeline.