Corrections is another term for prisons or jails. We have some corrections works. Use the keyword or subject search to find information using our library catalog. If interested in Deaf issues, check out the organization HEARD, which works on behalf of Deaf prisoners' rights. Check out the journal Corrections Today.
Encyclopedia of Community Corrections
In response to recognition in the late 1960s and early 1970s that traditional incarceration was not working, alternatives to standard prison settings were sought and developed. One of those alternatives--community-based corrections--had been conceived in the 1950s as a system that might prove more progressive, humane, and effective, particularly with people who had committed less serious criminal offenses and for whom incarceration, with constant exposure to serious offenders and career criminals, might prove more damaging than rehabilitative. The alternative of community corrections has evolved to become a substantial part of the criminal justice and correctional system, spurred in recent years not so much by a progressive, humane philosophy as by dramatically increasing prison populations, court orders to "fix" overextended prison settings, and an economic search for cost savings. Although community correction programs have been in place for some 40 years now, to date no comprehensive reference resource has tackled this topic. Accessible and jargon-free and available in both print and electronic formats, the one-volume Encyclopedia of Community Corrections will explore all aspects of community corrections, from its philosophical foundation to its current inception.Features & Benefits: 150 signed entries (each with Cross References and Further Readings) are organized in A-to-Z fashion to give students easy access to the full range of topics in community corrections. A thematic Reader′s Guide in the front matter groups entries by broad topical or thematic areas to make it easy for users to find related entries at a glance. In the electronic version, the Reader′s Guide combines with a detailed Index and the Cross References to provide users with convenient search-and-browse capacities. A Chronology in the back matter helps students put individual events into broader historical context. A Glossary provides students with concise definitions to key terms in the field. A Resource Guide to classic books, journals, and web sites (along with the Further Readings accompanying each entry) guides students to further resources in their research journeys. An Appendix offers statistics from the Bureau of Justice.
Reference Shelf: National Debate Topic 2020/21
This year's debate topic will focus on the issue of criminal justice reform. Central points include sentencing issues--mandatory minimums, truth in sentencing laws, and racial disparities; policing reform, including the role of police vs. social workers and health care workers as well as police brutality; reducing overcriminalization, particularly of drug possession; the War on Drugs as a cause of mass incarceration; a focus on rehabilitation vs. punishment in prisons; and juvenile justice reform. Significant recent developments include the 2019 First Step Act, which allows thousands of federal inmates to earn early release from prison, makes the reforms enacted by the Fair Sentencing Act of 2010 retroactive, and eases mandatory minimum requirements. Opponents of reform argue that measures such as these could result in violent criminals being released and recidivism.
America's Jails
A look at the contemporary crisis in U.S. jails with recommendations for improving and protecting the dignity of inmates Twelve million Americans go through the U.S. jail system on an annual basis. Jails, which differ significantly from prisons, are designed to house inmates for short amounts of time, and are often occupied by large populations of legally innocent people waiting for a trial. Jails often have deplorable sanitary conditions, and there are countless records of inmates being brutalized by staff and other inmates while in custody. Local municipalities use jails to institutionalize those whom they perceive to be a threat, so hundreds of thousands of inmates suffer from mental illness. People abandoned by families or lacking health insurance, or those who cannot afford bail, often cycle in and out of jails. In America's Jails, Derek Jeffreys draws on sociology, philosophy, history, and his personal experience volunteering in jails and prisons to provide an understanding of the jail experience from the inmates' perspective, focusing on the stigma that surrounds incarceration. Using his research at Cook County Jail, the nation's largest single-site jail, Jeffreys attests that jail inmates possess an inherent dignity that should govern how we treat them. Ultimately, fundamental changes in the U.S. jail system are necessary and America's Jails provides specific policy recommendations for changing its poor conditions. Highlighting the experiences of inmates themselves, America's Jails aims to shift public perception and understanding of jail inmates to center their inherent dignity and help eliminate the stigma attached to their incarceration.
Healing Corrections
Unlike critics who see the organizational cultures of prisons, jails, and community correction agencies as a problem that needs to be fixed with simple-sounding reforms, Chris Innes argues instead that these types of organizational cultures are adaptive and a source of strength that can be used to genuinely transform them. He shows how operational priorities, including safety and security, become much more difficult to sustain when organizational cultures become fragmented into disconnected subcultures. To transform an organizational culture, he argues, this fragmentation must be "healed" by changing the patterns of communication that make up the day-to-day reality of an organization's culture. Innes advocates an innovative approach based on the skills and practices of dialogue. He describes in detail how Dialogic Practice can be used to transform organizational cultures through an implementation process that begins with the leadership and cascades through the organization as an expanding circle, as staff are trained and become engaged in the process. Innes draws upon the research and policy literature in several fields, the contemporary national debate on the role of the justice system in American society, and his own experience during the last forty years in correctional research and policy, and in working directly with correctional agencies.This innovative approach to transforming organizational cultures will interest correctional decision makers; administrators, researchers, and graduate students in criminal justice; advocates; and others who manage mission-driven human services organizations.Hardcover is un-jacketed.
Issues in Corrections
Since the 1970s, the corrections system has experienced exponential growth. Over the past four decades, the number of inmates held in US prisons and jails has quadrupled. This massive growth is associated with a number of different issues and challenges within prisons and jails, including overcrowding; gang activity and misconduct; a shift away from rehabilitation and programming; expanded use of solitary confinement; inmates' human rights; criticisms of health care; and massive, publicly funded budgets. Many states now spend more on corrections than on higher education. This book explores these issues in depth. It takes current topics in institutional corrections and explores the main issues surrounding each. Themes include institutional corrections, prison behavior (including gangs and misconduct), solitary confinement, prison programming, and rehabilitation.
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