Course | Columbia Law School

This seminar is designed to explore the treatment of youth and families under the federal constitution and numerous federal and state statutes, and the law's regard for the unique relationships among children, their families and the state. The course will help students to understand the forces that shape family law, modern child welfare policy, juvenile justice, and related subjects. Students will use legal, economic, and sociological tools to examine such issues as the interests of institutionalized minors and their families; the exercise of youth liberty in the schoolhouse and in school-related activities; student privacy; the interests of children, families and the state in cases of alleged child abuse or neglect; state-sanctioned restrictions on the rights of minors; the state's responses to youth criminality; medical autonomy and decision-making; and the constitutionality of the juvenile death penalty. These subjects will be addressed from both doctrinal and public policy perspectives. Also addressed will be the pros and cons of litigatory efforts to improve public child-serving systems, and the challenges faced by Family Court judges in handling child-related individual cases.