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Date: April 29, 2024 Mon
Time: 8:32 pm
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Results for writing programs
2 results foundAuthor: Helfgott, Jacqueline B. Title: Process Evaluation of the Seattle Police Department's IF Project Summary: This document reports results from a one-year process evaluation of the Seattle Police Department's IF Project conducted September 2012 - June 2013. The IF project is a crime reduction and crime prevention program coordinated by the Seattle Police Department Community Outreach Unit that includes programmatic components that bridge law enforcement, corrections, juvenile justice, truancy programs, schools, and community agencies. The core component of the IF Project is a prison-based writing workshop in which inmates are posed the question: "If there was something someone could have said or done to change the path that led you here, what would it have been?" Additional programmatic components involve a monthly prison-based informational topic presentation and writing workshops in schools, courts, and juvenile justice facilities, and a recent expansion of the program to reentry assistance. The youth writing workshops involve Detective Bogucki and formerly incarcerated IF Project staff members who share their experiences and pose the IF question to youth followed by Q&A, breakout sessions, and resource referrals to help the youth with specific issues they are facing addressed in their written response to the question for the purpose of crime prevention. The IF project has received national media attention and it has been replicated in juvenile and adult correctional facilities and schools around the country. A comprehensive evaluation of the IF Project has not been conducted. A process evaluation of the truancy component of the IF Project was previously conducted by University of Washington researchers in 2012 (Walker, Trupin, & Guthrie, 2012); however, the study only examined the truancy portion of the IF Project involving 75 youth over a 6-month period. The one-year process evaluation was designed for the purpose of developing a comprehensive evaluation plan including developing an IF Project "tool-kit" describing the program structure, components and content, and conducting a pilot evaluation to pretest tools and methods to determine the appropriate research design and methodology for a future comprehensive evaluation. The evaluation involved developing and compiling program materials, administering pilot pre/post surveys, conducting observations analysis and conducting focus groups with incarcerated individuals in the Washington State Department of Corrections, juveniles incarcerated in King, Snohomish, and Skagit Counties, and youth attending schools in the Seattle Public School District. Evaluation measures were developed to investigate the extent to which the IF Project is achieving its intended goals -- to identify the needs of program participants, promote prosocial behavior, and prevent crime. On an applied level, the IF Project process evaluation offers empirical evidence that can be utilized by the Seattle Police Department Community Outreach Unit, IF Project staff, and other stakeholders to inform future development and implementation of IF Project components and replications of the IF Project in other regions. The process evaluation also includes a content analysis of the essays written in the workshops conducted for youth and adult incarcerated populations collected since the program began in 2010. Analysis of the IF Project essays extends and contributes to scholarship on general theories of crime (Agnew, 2005; Gottfredson & Hirschi, 1990; Tittle, 1993), trajectories of offending (e.g., Farrington, 2003; Laub & Sampson, 2006; Moffitt, 1993; Walters, 1990), and factors and individual-environment interactions influencing criminal behavior patterns (Helfgott, 2008; Horney, 2006; Robinson & Beaver, 2009; Thornberry, 1987) by identifying structural and social factors which condition individuals' varied life paths and opportunities for desistance from crime. The content analysis of the IF Project essays was included in the analysis as a measure of both IF Project process and outcome. While essay-writing is a major component of the program and a mechanism by which the IF Project participants are challenged to examine the path that led them to crime, essay writing and themes addressed can also be seen as a measure of success. For example, some IF Project participants are Lifers who may never be released. For these individuals, the act of writing down their thoughts and feelings regarding the factors that contributed to their path can be seen as a step toward healing and "mature coping" (Johnson, 2001, p. 83) that has potential benefits in terms of creating opportunities for constructive and pro-social adaptation to the prison environment. Details: Seattle, WA: Seattle University, Criminal Justice Department, 2014. 120p. Source: Internet Resource: Accessed June 20, 2017 at: https://www.seattleu.edu/media/college-of-arts-and-sciences/departments/criminaljustice/documents/IF-PROJECT-EVALUATION-FINAL-REPORT_Helfgott-Sumner-Gunnison-Collins-Rice-2014.pdf Year: 2014 Country: United States URL: https://www.seattleu.edu/media/college-of-arts-and-sciences/departments/criminaljustice/documents/IF-PROJECT-EVALUATION-FINAL-REPORT_Helfgott-Sumner-Gunnison-Collins-Rice-2014.pdf Shelf Number: 146301 Keywords: Correctional Programs Crime Prevention Police-Community Interactions Police-Community Relations Prison Programs Writing Programs |
Author: Bilby, Charlotte Title: Re-imagining futures: Exploring arts interventions and the process of desistance Summary: This report was commissioned by the Arts Alliance, the national body representing arts in criminal justice. Jointly funded by the Ministry of Justice and the Monument Trust, the Arts Alliance represents a growing network of over 470 arts practitioners and organisations working in prisons and the community to support men, women and young people to lead crime-free lives, through creative interventions. The coalition Government's Transforming Rehabilitation strategy and ongoing austerity measures mean rapid and complex change across the Criminal Justice System. This includes opening up the market, restructuring of the prison and probation service and the introduction of payment-by-results mechanisms to re-offending outcomes. The Transforming Rehabilitation agenda also includes acknowledgement of offenders' complex backgrounds and a call for increased development of offenders' vocational skills to enhance future employability alongside learning opportunities which address responsiveness and diversity issues (NOMS, 2012; MoJ, 2013). This landscape presents huge challenges and potential opportunities for innovative arts projects, which contribute towards the important 'intermediate' outcomes that enable individuals to make positive steps towards effective rehabilitation. This research, along with the growing body of evidence, suggests there are strong reasons to consider arts in criminal justice an area of considerable significance and innovation. Arts practice aims to bring about a positive affect experience in the participant (Parkes & Bilby, 2010). The affective experience, which can include a sense of community cohesion, that time is passing at a different pace, or an improved feeling of self-satisfaction and achievement, can be linked to desistance from crime. Desistance is the process by which people who have offended stop offending (primary desistance) and then take on a personal narrative (Maruna, 2001) that supports a continuing non-offending lifestyle (secondary desistance). Change is not a linear process; rather some will zigzag and will offend again on the journey to secondary desistance. In order for desistance from crime to take place, Giordano, Cernkovich and Rudolph (2002: 999-1002) suggest that there is a four-stage process which includes an openness to change; exposure and reaction to 'hooks' for change (or turning points); imagining and believing in a 'replacement self'; and a change in the way that offending and deviant behaviour is viewed. Maruna (2007: 652) notes that 'desistance is typically understood to be more than just an absence of crime. Desistance is the maintenance of crime-free behaviour and is an - active process in itself- it involves the pursuit of a positive life'. This research considers the possible relationships between the intricate process of abstaining from crime and the influence that taking part in some form of art-based enrichment activity might have on participants. Employing a qualitative methodology, the research addresses a number of questions linked to intermediate steps (or outcomes) in an individual's journey to desistance from crime. The research specifically explores how arts interventions contribute towards enabling people to form positive identities, build new narratives and build positive relationships with peers, staff and family. It also begins to investigate how arts interventions enable people to make significant behavioural changes. The latest National Offender Management Service (NOMS) Commissioning Intentions Document (October 2013) recognises the importance and complexity of these intermediate steps, which may lead to desistance from crime. The research team investigated five arts projects in four criminal justice settings, including practising visual arts in a high security adult male prison; music and deejaying skills with young offenders in the community; a music making project in a resettlement (open) prison and creative writing and bookbinding in a closed female prison. The research team spent at least four sessions with each of the projects observing the activities and interviewing participants, arts practitioners and prison staff as part of an in-depth qualitative methodology. The team also used participants' written work and evaluations, and examples of the work produced in the arts activities. This data was analysed using a thematic, content analysis approach. This piece of research demonstrates a clear link between taking part in arts-based activities and the movement towards secondary desistance. It identifies the importance of arts practice for the participants and shows what types of outcomes successful projects should be producing. The research also highlights the importance of collecting qualitative as well as quantitative data on arts projects and their participants when measuring these changes. Analysis of the data across all five projects produced the following key findings: - Participation in arts activities enables individuals to begin to redefine themselves, an important factor in desistance from crime. - Arts projects facilitate high levels of engagement. This is significant because many individuals in contact with the Criminal Justice System have struggled to engage with productive activities in the past. Participants must engage in order to be able to redefine themselves. Engagement in arts projects has also been shown to lead to greater participation in education and work-related activities. - Arts projects can have a positive impact on how people manage themselves during their sentence, particularly on their ability to cooperate with others - including other participants and staff. This correlates with increased self-control and better problem-solving skills. - Engagement with arts projects facilitates increased compliance with criminal justice orders and regimes. - Arts projects are responsive to participants' individual needs. Current policy documentation on commissioning services to meet offenders' needs highlights the importance of responsiveness in meeting diverse needs. The status of arts practitioners as professional artists is highly significant in the success of projects and their impact on participants. The value of this should not be underestimated by agencies of the Criminal Justice System when considering using external organisations. - Arts projects provide safe spaces for individuals to have positive experiences and begin to make individual choices. The findings from this research clearly indicate that arts projects can contribute to an individual's journey to desistance. The findings highlight key outcomes for participants and the importance of the relationships with project facilitators. There is now a need for longitudinal research, combining both qualitative and quantitative methods, to assess how far the findings presented here are sustained in the long term. Details: London: Arts Alliance, 2013. 66p. Source: Internet Resource: Accessed march 25, 2019 at: http://nrl.northumbria.ac.uk/16846/1/Re-imagining_Futures_Research_Report_Final.pdf Year: 2013 Country: United Kingdom URL: http://nrl.northumbria.ac.uk/16846/1/Re-imagining_Futures_Research_Report_Final.pdf Shelf Number: 155161 Keywords: Arts ProgramsCorrectional ProgramsDesistanceMusic TherapyMusical ProgramsOffender RehabilitationRecidivismRehabilitation ProgramsWriting Programs |