Mental Health and the Intersectionality of Race and Gender of Crossover Youth

African American youth and their kinship families engaged in dual systems of care (i.e., child welfare system and juvenile justice system) commonly known as “crossover youth” can become overwhelmed by the competing priorities of both systems. While one system purports to advance a best interests standard of children in out of home care, the other, is stated to be centered on tenets of restorative justice. Children and families simultaneously involved in systems that are incompatible can be very difficult to negotiate. In addition to the traditional developmental gaps in crossover youth development there are subsequent layers that contribute to the youth’s identity at the point of intersectionality. The presence of multiple selves and the lack of stability to navigate nuanced personas in these dual systems creates discourse relative to poly-victimization, serial victimization, and betrayal trauma. As a community-based strategy, to address the structural and systemic disconnect of these competing systems in the lives of African American families of crossover youth in kinship care settings, A Second Chance, Inc. (ASCI), a Pennsylvania nonprofit dedicated to kinship care, created a High Intensity Kinship Unit to address these competing systems. ASCI’s In-Home Clinical Service department highlights youth’s mental health concerns while collaborating with the High Impact Unit (HIU) who services to bridge systemic gaps, address the nuances inherent in the child welfare and juvenile justice; and to improve the outcomes for success for African American crossover youth. This article will advance a community-based framework based on the strengths of the Black family. Centered on the frameworks of Critical Race Theory and Self-Efficacy, the aim of this article is to examine strategies used by a community-based agency to address the structural racism of the systems of care, as well as to better understanding the role of self-efficacy when working with youth crossover as it relates to their educational and mental health needs. Lastly, the aim of this manuscript is to provide practical and effective interventions when working with African American crossover youth in kinship care, through a community-based lens.