Acadiana Teen Court-Lafayette (ATC-Lafayette) is a juvenile diversion program that offers young first-time offenders who admit guilt an opportunity to make restitution for their offense(s) through community service, educational classes, and jury service. Its primary goal is to prevent juvenile offenders between the ages of 10-18 from being sent through the judicial system. The court will be ready to hear its first case on October 20, 2015. Some of the offenses that could be referred to the ATC are larceny, underage drinking, traffic infractions, smoking violations in schools, and truancy.

Teen Court helps to maintain discipline in a positive way that addresses the minor mistakes young people make while keeping them engaged in learning. The Acadiana Teen Court process holds student offenders accountable for their behavior by a jury of their peers. Utilizing the powerful impact of positive peer influence and parental support, Teen Court programs have proven to be very effective in changing student behavior.

Volunteer Teen Leaders from A New Vision Leadership of Acadiana are excited and ready to work with young teen offenders by being positive role models and showing the offenders that they have the power to control the direction of their lives by making positive choices.