Category: Advocacy Groups

Common Application bans the box!

On August 7, 2018, the Common Application announced  that it is dropping the criminal history question from its college application form starting with 2019-2020 applicants.  Currently over 800 colleges and universities use the common application.  The criminal history question first appeared on the common application in 2006.  Individual colleges who are members of the Common Application will still be able to make inquiry on their own. For the past decade, the Common Application has been under pressure from advocates, educators and the U.S. Education Department under the Obama administration to remove the criminal history question from its application form.  The call to remove the criminal history question from college applications first came from the Center for Community Alternatives (CCA) in its 2010 publication, The Use of Criminal History Records in College Admissions Reconsidered.  A second study with policy recommendation was published by CCA in collaboration with the Education from the Inside Out Coalition in 2015, Boxed Out: Criminal History Screening and College Application Attrition, and underscored the harm done by the use of the criminal history box on college applications. As more colleges and universities have banned the box, the Common Application has been under growing pressure to abolish this […]

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Landmark criminal record disclosure case in the UK Supreme Court

Court litigation and policy debate revolving around the issue of criminal record disclosure are not unique to the United States. Especially in the United Kingdom, the past few years have witnessed important court decisions on the legal framework in place regulating access to criminal history information and the amount of information that can be obtained by third parties. For people with criminal records in the United Kingdom, last month was pretty significant.  This is why I am very happy to post on the CCRC blog a commentary on recent litigation before the UK Supreme Court authored by Christopher Stacey, co-director of Unlock, an independent charity organization that provides a voice and support for people with convictions who are facing stigma and obstacles because of their criminal record. Christopher last month led Unlock’s intervention before the UK Supreme Court. They put forward strong arguments on behalf of those who are unfairly affected by the criminal records disclosure regime. Before discussing the case, let me briefly summarize the framework of the disclosure regime currently in place in the UK.  This regime and the ongoing court litigation should be particularly interesting to advocates and lawmakers in the U.S. who are working to reform their own […]

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NC expands certificate law, taking three steps forward, one step back

The states are on a roll in passing new “second chance” legislation.  In addition to the extraordinary new Pennsylvania bill on automatic sealing we posted about earlier today, we’ve just learned that the North Carolina legislature has approved a bill modifying eligibility for judicial Certificates of Relief.  Certificates, which are available from the sentencing court one year after sentencing, remove mandatory collateral consequences (including in employment and licensing), certify that an individual poses no public safety risk, and provide negligent hiring protection.  The bill has been sent to the Governor for signature, we will inform you as soon as he has done so.   Hat’s off to our friends at the North Carolina Justice Center, who worked hard to get this bill passed!    The bill will provide further relief and opportunity for people with multiple convictions.  The “one step back” referred to in the title of this post is that while the bill significantly expands eligibility for misdemeanors and the lowest level felonies, it also removes from eligibility one class of felony.   It is inevitable that there will occasionally be some last-minute counter-current in pressing for extension of relief provisions.   In North Carolina, what might have been cause for discouragement has evidently […]

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Major new federal awards support second chance advocacy

Earlier this week the U.S. Departments of Justice and Labor made two major awards to the Council of State Governments (CSG) to support the development of resources on collateral consequences and second chance programs.  The awards aim to build capacity within the advocacy community to assist those seeking restoration of rights and status nationwide. The first award is a $4.6 million contract awarded by the Labor Department for the development of the National Clean Slate Clearinghouse, a federal initiative first announced by President Obama last November.  The Clearinghouse is intended to “build capacity for legal services needed to help with record-cleaning, expungement, and related civil legal services.” The second award is a $5 million grant from the Bureau of Justice Assistance to support the ongoing work of the National Reentry Resource Center (NRRC), a project developed by CSG in 2011 with federal funding earmarked in the Second Chance Act of 2007.  One exciting aspect of that award is that it will bring the National Inventory of the Collateral Consequences of Conviction (NICCC) into the NRRC fold.

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Will Prez Obama make federal contractors ban the box? [Update: Not now.]

  Updated April 29: According to comments late this week from senior White House adviser Valerie Jarrett, the President remains inclined to defer to Congress when it comes to making federal contractors ban the box: Asked whether there was consideration of whether to take action to require federal contractors to “ban the box,” Jarrett said, “The president has supported federal legislation that would ban the box for federal contractors. He thinks that’s the best approach.” The legislation in question appears to have stalled, as noted by its sponsor Rep. Elijah Cummings.  (In a tweet, Jarrett pointed advocates to a 2013 directive of the Office of Federal Contract Compliance reminding contractors of their obligation to comply with the EEOC guidance on criminal records.) On the other hand, on Friday the administration made good on its November promise to require federal agencies to ban the box, when OPM announced a proposed rule requiring federal agencies to postpone inquiry into an applicant’s criminal record until after a conditional offer of employment has been made. Also, marking the end of National Reentry Week, the President formally established the Federal Interagency Reentry Council, a Cabinet-level working group dedicated to “the rehabilitation and reintegration of individuals returning […]

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