Mission & Vision Statement

Mission

To promote justice for all children by ensuring excellence in youth defense.

Statement of Beliefs

The Gault Center believes that a strong youth defense delivery system is a vital mechanism for ensuring that:

• All children in the legal system have ready and timely access to skilled, well-resourced, well-trained lawyers;
• All children are afforded full protection of their constitutional, statutory, and human rights;
• All children receive legal representation that is client-centered, individualized, developmentally and age appropriate, and free of bias; and
• All children have opportunities to attain their potential to become productive members of society.

For these reasons, The Gault Center believes that the youth defense bar must:

• Enhance its skill, capacity, and commitment to professionalism;
• Cultivate leadership to promote accountability and bring about reform in the juvenile legal system; and
• Build collaborations, partnerships, and community involvement to advance the youth defense delivery system.

Vision Statement

The Gault Center works to create a strong youth defense delivery system where:

• The representation of children is specialized and resources and opportunities exist for youth defenders to fully exercise and enhance their legal, management, leadership, and advocacy skills;
• All children are treated with respect, dignity, and fairness;
• Juvenile courts are knowledgeable, sensitive, and responsive to the needs of children;
• Youth defenders have parity of resources, compensation, and opportunity for advancement with adult defenders and prosecutors; and
• Excellence is routine.

Values

Serve, with tenacity

We are poised at every moment to address the most pressing challenges and seize all opportunities to advance the defense of young people. We know that in doing this, we must work efficiently and expeditiously. There is no task that is too big or too small in our service.

Listen, with curiosity

We recognize that knowing what to do comes from listening. We listen to understand the successes and challenges that our team and community experience. We listen with humility and are receptive to new ideas, points of view, and strategies.

Collaborate, with compassion

We honor and embrace each other’s unique talents, perspectives, and experiences. Diversity centers our work and is the strength of the organization. Our team is most effective when we encourage, recognize, and value each other’s perspectives, cultural differences, and contributions.

Inspire, with excellence

We strive for the quality of our work to set the standard for advocacy in youth defense. When we do our best, we inspire others to do the same, with intentionality, quality, and respect.

Lead, with courage

We lead with heart to ensure liberty and equity for young people. Even when uncomfortable, we push ourselves and each other to investigate and transform systems of injustice. We evolve and adapt to new realities in service of our youth defense community.