DEVELOPING, MANAGING, AND EVALUATING INNOVATIVE REENTRY PROJECTS
NYC Justice Corps: The NYC Justice Corps brings young adults involved with the criminal justice system together with their communities to identify and address unmet community needs. Through meaningful service to their communities, internships, and job and educational opportunities, the NYC Justice Corps provides members with practical skills, social support and leadership training. By actively partnering with the NYC Justice Corps, communities own the success and reintegration of their young people as contributing members of society. The NYC Justice Corps aims to improve the education and employment outcomes of Corps members, keep them out of the criminal justice system, and support community development in specific New York City communities.
John Jay College has worked closely with the NYC Department of Correction to design and launch the NYC Justice Corps with funding from the NYC Center for Economic Opportunity. Bedford Stuyvesant Restoration Corporation and Phipps Community Development Corporation serve as the community-based partners in Bedford-Stuyvesant, Brooklyn and the South Bronx. The Center for Employment Opportunities provides technical assistance and capacity building to ensure the Justice Corps is successful.
The NYC Justice Corps will complete its first year of services in October 2009; the program served 275 young adults in its first year and intends to serve 250 individuals during the second year of operations. Westat, Inc. completed an implementation evaluation of the first program year, assessing the Justice Corps’ start-up and program development efforts, in addition to some of the program’s first-year outcomes. Findings from this report will be made available to the public late Fall 2009. Westat is completing random assignment for the program’s outcome evaluation, which has been extended to include three cohorts in the second program year. To date, 515 young adults are enrolled in the longitudinal study. For a description of this exciting initiative click here.
PROVIDING PRACTITIONERS AND POLICYMAKERS WITH CUTTING EDGE TOOLS AND EXPERTISE
Community-Based Organization Jail Reentry Toolkit: In partnership with The Urban Institute, PRI is developing a guide oriented for community-based organizations on establishing and sustaining meaningful and effective partnerships with their local jail. The guide will include background information about the criminal justice system and an understanding of the importance of collaborating with their local jail. It will feature profiles of partnerships from around the country that demonstrate success in improving service delivery and improved outcomes for individuals returning home. The guide will be available early Spring 2010.
Online Reentry Certificate Course and Community-Based Town Hall Collaborative: PRI is collaborating with the Fortune Society, a New York City-based community-based organization that provides reentry services, to develop an online reentry certificate course and toolkits to better equip practitioners in their efforts to promote successful reentry. The online certificate course will draw from evidence-based practices from the field. In addition, PRI and the Fortune Society will convene four meetings among stakeholders in Harlem to address a range of issues related to serving people returning home from prison. These meetings will take place in late 2009 and the first half of 2010; the online certificate course and toolkits will be available Summer 2010.
Jail Reentry Collaborative: In partnership with The Urban Institute and the Montgomery County Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation and with support from the Bureau of Justice Assistance, we formed a Jail Reentry Collaborative, convened a roundtable on jail reentry issues in June 2006, and drafted the monograph, Life after Lockup: Improving Reentry from Jail to the Community and The Jail Administrator’s Toolkit for Reentry. For a link to roundtable papers and summary of the Roundtable, click here. For a link to The Toolkit and Life After Lockup, click here.
Reel Reentry Film Series: The Reel Reentry Film Series provides practitioners an opportunity to explore issues related to incarceration and reentry through the lens of motion pictures and documentaries.
Occasional Series on Reentry Research: The Prisoner Reentry Institute coordinates monthly lectures to facilitate interdisciplinary dialogue between and among practitioners, policymakers and researchers in the New York City metropolitan area. For a list of past lectures, including copies of reports and journal articles, biographies, powerpoint presentations, and selected bibliographies, see the Occasional Series Events page.
PROMOTING EDUCATION OPPORTUNITIES FOR CURRENTLY AND FORMERLY INCARCERATED INDIVIDUALS AS A VEHICLE FOR SUCCESSFUL REENTRY AND REINTEGRATION
Reentry Roundtable on Education: In partnership with The Urban Institute, we sponsored a national roundtable on education and reentry on March 31 and April 1, 2008. The meeting, made possible by funding support from the United States Departments of Education and Justice, the Achelis-Bodman Foundation, and other private funders, focused on the intersections of education, incarceration and reentry. The two days of discussion explored the need for and current state of correctional education and identified promising programmatic and policy directions. We examined the broad continuum of education programs – including ABE, GED, vocational, and post-secondary – serving individuals with criminal records in prisons and jails and after release.
In preparation for the Roundtable, we commissioned seven academic papers focused on specific topics related to the intersection of education, incarceration, and reentry. Papers and a two-hour DVD of the Roundtable discussion are available. A monograph highlighting the Roundtable findings is also available. To view copies of the commissioned papers, the two-hour DVD and the full report, click here.
Reentry Resource Guide on Education Planning: We authored Back to School: A Guide for Continuing Your Education after Prison, a resource guide for individuals leaving state prison interested in furthering their education upon release (funded by the U.S. Department of Education). The guide is available here.
IDENTIFYING “PULSE POINTS” AND CREATING SYNERGY ACROSS FIELDS AND DISCIPLINES
Entrepreneurship and Reentry: While our nation’s policy makers are starting to comprehend the importance of employment in the reintegration of people with criminal records, little attention is being paid to the opportunity entrepreneurship represents to promote self-determination and empowerment. To explore the viability of entrepreneurship as a reentry strategy, we conducted a year-long project (funded by the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation) culminating in a newly released monograph. Venturing beyond the Gates: Facilitating Successful Reentry with Entrepreneurship includes overviews of the fields of criminal justice, reentry, entrepreneurship, and microenterprise; opportunities represented by bridging these fields; funding opportunities; and profiles of microenterprise programs working with currently and formerly incarcerated individuals. It finds that, for some formerly incarcerated individuals, entrepreneurial training provides an opportunity to capitalize on their talents and skills, become agents of change in their lives and families, and contribute to the vibrancy and health of our communities. To read the monograph, click here.
