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A Shift in Thinking in Community Corrections

I turned 54 when I started writing this post.  So... I’m “old” (at least that is what my four kids tell me).  Another birthday simply means I have personally experienced many shifts in business and information technology in the past half century including but not limited to the following: 

• Mainframes taking whole floors of buildings to networked devices that practically disappear into our surroundings

• Transaction systems in isolated silos to enterprise database systems that allow rapid integration and collaboration

• Large scale custom software projects to highly configurable "off the shelf" software products 

• Simple single function web sites to comprehensive Enterprise web portals

• Cloud technologies such as Software as a Service (SaaS), Platform as a Service (PaaS), and Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) 

So what does my technology and software experience have to do with today’s community corrections business?

The Tender Topic of Relapse in Community Corrections

While doing Motivational Interviewing training with community corrections staff, we began discussing the stages of change and specifically the topic of relapse. The stage of relapse brought up an interesting discussion with the group about which clients should get second chances.  

John: “I can see giving the direct sentence clients a second chance but I don’t think the clients coming from prison should get any chances, if they relapse, they are gone.  They should be grateful they even got a chance to get out of prison.”

Lisa: “What do other people think about that?”

Susie: “I think that this is a treatment program and we need to provide the client with treatment, terminating them isn’t going to do anything.”

Josie: “It depends on the client, does he want help?”

Jim: “A lot of times these clients who relapse act like they want help around admin and case management staff but we hear what they really say.  They know they can get away with using and just ask for help.”

The conversation went back and forth with valid points in each direction.

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Trust Is Like Air

I do not personally know most of you, but I’d like to take a stab at your latest marching orders from above.  Does it sound something like this? Implement EBP now!

Pretty simple right?  Use the NIC model (or stay tuned for the release of CorrectTech’s revised model soon) and implement the stated principles ASAP.  It can’t be that difficult, right?  Community Corrections has been talking about evidence based practices for decades now.  Time to walk the talk!  It will improve outcomes, public safety, communities and budgets.  It is a win-win-win.

Are We Losing Credibility?

If this has not been your marching order yet, it will be soon.  Day 1 will include googling something like “community corrections EBP implementation”.  You will find a variety of states and programs that speak eloquently about the value of EBP, but have not been able or willing to actually take the leap.  You will find other states that have demonstrated significant progress in the implementation journey.  Still other states or agencies have tried desperately for years, with sincere intentions and ample resources, only to be met with lack of results that meet up with the promise.  No wonder it is not uncommon to hear an old school criminal justice professional refer to EBP evangelism as “drinking The Kool Aid” or the “Latest Snake Oil”. 

This is the 7th of a 7 part series on The Risk Principle Simplified.  Subscribe to our blog and get the next series delivered right to your inbox.

Allowing High Risk Offenders to "Fail First"

While the danger of over-intervening with low risk offenders is generally acknowledged and respected, there is a trend toward policy makers ignoring the opposite side of the coin. For a variety of political and financial reasons, high risk offenders are receiving low intensity interventions under a “fail first model”. Instead of matching intensity of the intervention to the assessed risk level, high risk offenders are being provided low intensity interventions with the idea that when they fail, they will be provided a higher level of supervision. This policy has negative consequences for the following stakeholders: Victims, Offenders and The EBP Movement.

This is the 6th of a 7 part series on The Risk Principle Simplified.  Subscribe to our blog and get the series delivered right to your inbox.

What factors contribute to risk?

Just like the insurance industry, the risk model for offenders has very specific factors to consider. These models were developed in the exact same way that life insurance risk levels are determined. The life insurance industry looks at factors that correlate with early death. The criminal risk model looks at factors that correlate with future criminal behavior. Similarly, some of these factors can be changed (“dynamic risk factors” or “needs”) and others are static. Our next white paper, The Need Principle Simplified, will address “The Key 3” and how various offender situational and personal characteristics interact to increase or decrease criminogenic risk.

When High Risk is Too High: The Psychopath

Imagine what you would be capable of if you were completely self-interested and did not experience fear or guilt. While it is tough to even imagine,