Centre for Children Committing Offences

hild Development Institute (CDI) is a multi-service organization helping children aged 0-12 and their families in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. With a Canadian focus, and international presence, the Centre for Children Committing Offences at CDI’s mission is to advance knowledge and evidence based solutions for communities dealing with children at risk of anti-social behaviour and their families. This unit works collaboratively with researchers, policy makers, clinicians and other professionals to advance research and social policy, conduct training, and strategically disseminate knowledge so that communities have at their fingertips an empirically based comprehensive 3-stage crime prevention strategy designed specifically for young children in conflict with the law. This involves 1) gender-specific programs that serve aggressive and antisocial children and their families, 2) risk assessment guides that predict risk of future antisocial potential in young children, and 3) police-community protocols that establish efficient referral mechanisms to organizations that serve this specific population of children. CDI is the home of SNAP (Stop Now And Plan) -- the most fully developed longest sustained empirically-based intervention to date designed for this target population.