Due to overwhelming interest, we’re excited to announce that we moved the symposium to March 3-4, 2025 and to a new location, Embassy Suites, Cary, NC, to accommodate all attendees! 

SYMPOSIUM OVERVIEW

Women face unique biological, psychological, and social challenges that can impact their substance use and substance use treatment outcomes. Justice-involved women often face even more complex challenges when it comes to substance use and treatment outcomes including an increased likelihood of co-occurring mental health disorders and a history of trauma and victimization. For these reasons, justice-involved women are likely to have continued engagement in substance use and other high-risk behaviors, which may contribute to recidivism and continued criminal justice involvement.

The Justice-Involved Women and Substance Use Symposium (JIWSU) aims to accelerate the application of evidence-based, gender-responsive, and trauma-informed practices by bringing together a diverse group of experts from the criminal justice, social work, and public health fields around the shared goal of improving substance use treatment outcomes for justice-involved women.