Higher Education and Advanced Training for Corrections
Ray Bynum
Lorraine Priest
University Of Phoenix
College of Criminal Justice & Security
School of Advanced Studies
March 2013
Abstract
In 1967, the President’s Commission on Law Enforcement recognized the need to increase the education level of criminal justice. The Minnesota Study (1978) identified core competencies that could be accomplished by a community college or university. Michigan Department of Corrections requires that 15 semester hours of college be completed as condition of employment probation. However, most correctional officer education has been of a basic level. The shortage of advanced education in Corrections has provided an opportunity for course development by colleges and universities.
Community colleges in Florida, Michigan, North Carolina, and Texas provide basic corrections officer training for jails/ prisons. These community colleges also provide in-service training for both jails/ prison correctional officers. National correctional associations provide online courses for correctional officers and administrators.
The University of Phoenix, College of Criminal Justice and Security, is developing advanced online courses for corrections officers at Wayne County Sheriff Department (Detroit) - Corrections. The online courses are based on the associate/ bachelor degree level of criminal justice. These courses are being designed for usage by correctional agencies through- out the United States.
Higher Education and Advanced Training for Corrections
“Somehow we’ve gotten the idea that we are different and we have put up an
imaginary boundary based on the demographics of the world…we put up all
these imaginary lines and the world is not like that…All they (barriers) keep us
from doing is what we really need to do to be productive. “
(BiermaBardish, p. 411)
Introduction
When college students are asked if a college degree should be mandatory for police
officers, most will answer yes. When the same students are asked if a college degree
should be mandatory for corrections officers, many would question the need for
collegeeducation for corrections officers.
In a keynote address about educational issues in corrections, Lewis (1994)
stated that in society, most people thought of the law enforcement officer first, then
the criminal. However in corrections most people thought of the inmate first and
almost never considered the officer. The public tended to be more interested in the
rehabilitation of inmates, rather than education for corrections officers.
He contended the key to the future success of the inmate or the officer was through
education. He stated “for society to benefit, we all have to believe in education. The
right education in the right situation makes the difference to the teacher, the
administrator, the supervisor, the officer and the inmate” (Lewis, 1994, p. 2).
College Education and Corrections
In 1908, August Vollmer, police chief of Berkley, CA. contacted the University of
California, Berkley, to establish classes in criminology. In 1930, San Jose State offered
the first Associate degree in criminal justice. In 1965, the Law Enforcement Assistance
Act was established to improve law enforcement and corrections. This Act provided
assistance to colleges and universities to develop criminal justice classes.
The 1967 President’s Commission stressed the need for higher education in criminal
Justice. While some colleges and universities were able to develop some college
Corrections courses and degrees, most efforts were to provide basic corrections
training.
Many state corrections agencies have established agreements with local community
colleges to provide a basic corrections academy. Larger metropolitan jails have been
able develop advanced training for the corrections officers. Smaller rural jails haven’t
always been able to do so.
Mental health, technology and other issues has forced Corrections to improve its staff
training. Many associations have provided some training opportunities for the
Corrections staff.
In June 2012, the University of Phoenix was asked to develop advanced online
training for Wayne County Sheriff Department – Corrections (Detroit). The Wayne
County Project was designed as a self- paced college level course with no instructor/ no
textbook. This was later modified to be used on a national scale for both large and small
correctional facilities.
Collaboration between criminal justice agencies and colleges/ universities has been
slowly evolving to address the needs of the correctional facilities and staff.
Literature Review
1967 President’s Commission on Law Enforcement and the Administration of Justice
The civil rights riots in the 1950s and 60s, resulted in a comprehensive review of
the criminal justice system which included law enforcement, corrections, probation and
the court system. The 1967 President’s Commission believed that the educational
standards for the criminal justice system had to raised and vastly improved.
“If educational standards are raised…they should have a significant positive long term effect on community relations. Police personnel with two to four years of college should have a better appreciation of people with different racial, economic and cultural backgrounds or at least, should have the innate ability to acquire such understanding. Studies support the proposition that well educated persons are less prejudiced toward minority groups than the poorly educated.”
(Winslow, 1968, p. 278).
The lack of basic and advanced education in Corrections was noted in several
investigations involving jail/prison riots and hostage situations since the 1970s
through -out the United States. The Attica Riot (1971) resulted in the death of
corrections officers and inmates. The New Mexico State prison riot (1980) resulted in
numerous inmate deaths and brutal attacks on officers. Prison riots took place in
Michigan in the early 1980s resulting in damage to correctional facilities.
The corrections officer hostage situation at the Morey Unit- Buckeye State Prison
(2004) in Arizona was seen as a result of “inadequate or non - existent training”. A
lack of advanced education was cited as a contributing factor with these situations
involving corrections.
The Center for Innovative Public Policies (2000) stated the typical corrections
officer had been a white male with a high school diploma. Today’s workforce was more
diverse with many cultures, a mix of generations and both genders actively involved.
Corrections is more technology driven, which required a higher degree of
education.
Corrections faced problems, such as high turnover, leadership that was often
poorly trained, non/competitive pay packages and benefits. The possibility of
privatization and the pressure of balancing career, school and family (Center for
Innovative Public Policies, 2000) was always present for the corrections officer.
In most cases, corrections officers needed a high school diploma or GED as a
minimum condition for employment (Stinchcomb, 2004). While there was no
requirement for higher education for corrections officers, individuals with associate’s
degrees or higher were more frequently employed at correctional facilities.
Higher Education and Jails
According to Norman (2003), literature and curricula involving jails were almost
non- existent. A small percentage of criminal justice curricula focused on prisons,
with no mention of jails. In 2002, state and federal prisons held more than 1.3 million
inmates.
While jails held approximately 665,475 inmates longer than 24 hours (mid 2002),
the American Jail Association (Norman, 2003) estimated that over 13 million
inmates were booked into jails annually and held for less than 24 hours. When the
criminal is arrested and brought to the jail, it is the corrections officer whom is
responsible to deal with inmate with possible drug, alcohol and mental problems. As the
inmate population increases, so does the need for a better educated corrections officers
For the criminal justice system to improve, the relationship between higher
education, law enforcement and corrections needs to be examined. Leadership must
emanate from these organizations in order to develop advanced education that will
transform the individual and the organization to achieve “self - actualization” (Maslow,
1968). For criminal justice agencies to transform into highly professional organizations,
advanced education, staff educational levels, and development of advanced/higher
curricula must be assessed, developed and implemented.
Buerger (2004) believed community college and university criminal justice curricula
were in conflict with the criminal justice system. Some community colleges provided
college credits for the basic academy. Higher education and the criminal justice system
had to communicate and create an educational program that enhanced the substantial
amount of information being presented in the basic academy (Buerger,2004). Higher
education needed to build upon the basic information providing the officer with a more
in-depth examination of corrections.
Creaton & Clements (2011) stated even though there existed a “general distrust”
between academia and the street officer, efforts by organizations and higher education
has resulted in the inclusion of more college graduates into criminal justice. Many
higher education institutions have entered into partnerships to provide online training
programs for criminal justice.
While there was an emphasis bydifferent groups for providing higher education by
colleges and universities to transform law enforcement organizations, there has been a
lack of emphasis on advanced and higher education for corrections.
Minnesota Study
A comprehensive study was conducted by Minnesota POST (1978) on the basic
police education and skills that were required of a police officer. The study concluded
that basic skills for both male and female police officers were the same. These skills
could be taught at a community college or university criminal justice program to certify
all new officers prior to employment.
The financial burden of initial education would be paid by the individual with
reimbursement by the State of Minnesota if the officers successfully completed the
course of study and were employed by police departments. The department would only
provide the advanced education and any specialized education for officers.
Minnesota POST (1978) believed that by requiring all prospective officers to attain
certification through a college or university prior to employment by a police
department, their departments would become more professional and save money by
providing only advanced education. If officers did not attend college in Minnesota, a
basic eight week course was provided at the college for certification.
The police chiefs and sheriffs (Minnesota POST, 1978) had no preference in the
college degree obtained by the officer. Administrators were more concerned about skills
the officers acquired during college: critical- thinking skills, oral and written
communications, and obtaining adequate research prior to taking action. These skills
also included the ability to handle stress, and being able to make individual / group
presentations. College would give the officer an adequate introduction to world, ethnic
and gender issues.
College credit requirement in Corrections
The 1967 Commission, the Minnesota study and other studies emphasized the need
for college level training for law enforcement. However, the need for college level
training for corrections has been more debatable. Investigations of major incidents have
cited the lack of advanced training as a contributing factor, yet most college criminal
justiceprograms only provides an Introduction to Corrections course in its curriculum.
After a series of riots occurred in the 1970s and early 1980s, a fifteen college-credit
requirement for corrections officer employment was enacted by the Michigan
Corrections Officer Training Council in 1983 (Ambroyer, 1991).
The Michigan Department of Corrections requires officers to either take classes prior
to being hired or within the first 18 months of employment in order to meet the education
requirements for certification. These courses included two college classes in
corrections, two in counseling/human behavior and one involving legal issues in
corrections. These classes were a separate requirement from the basic academy.
Currently Michigan DOC is the only corrections department that requires college
Education.
Changing the Corrections Culture
When direct supervision jails were introduced in the early 1980’s, the premise was
the design of housing units with the physical presence of the officer in the housing
unit would greatly reduce potential problems. Perroncello (2002) argued the
statement “direct supervision facility design would solve correction’s problems” (p. 26)
was misleading. While the change of building design can resolve many issues, “unless
the staff culture is transformed, then nothing has really changed” (Perroncello, 2002,p.
26).
Changing the culture takes active commitment and education. In-service education
had primarily focused on crisis issues and mandated training such as CPR, driver
training, etc. Advanced education had to focus on communications, interpersonal
relationships and leadership to make a difference (Perroncello,2002).
A new generation of corrections officers
StewartCawthon (2010) noted generations have an impact on the beliefs,
values and experiences of corrections officers . There are very little in changes to the
way corrections officers and managers view these beliefs and values. The corrections
field needs to prepare itself for the needs of today’s work force and the need to rebrand
corrections so that the field will be ready for the new generations. Stewart & Cawthon
(2010) noted there are four distinct generations in the corrections field today.
These generations are identified as those born before 1943 as veterans, baby
boomers born between 1943 and 1964, generation Xers born between 1965 and 1980
and millennial being been born between 1981 and 1998. The thoughts of each
generation having unique traits and characteristic leads to the influence on behaviors
and interactions in the workplace.
Many of the veterans have retired and the baby boomers are preparing to retire
from the work force. The Xers and millennial will be the upcoming generations. The
challenge will be to make the generational shift that will impact the operations, culture
and systems in the corrections field.
Generation X and Millennial
About 30 years ago there was no shortage of officers as the generation was
primarily focused on working their way up the ladder. They generally lived to work,
had strong work ethics and were loyal to the organizations. However, there has been a
shiftin these beliefs as the generation X and millennial corrections officers are being
introduced into the system.
In a study done by Fogg, Kehoe and Kestner(2007), it was discovered that younger
generations will not be as loyal and stay on the job as long as previous generations.
These groups will change careers four to five times before they turn 55. Fogg, Kehoe
andKestner (2007) noted there needed to be more focus on the upcoming generations.
Correctional organizations would have to look and develop valuable skills that will be
needed to keep up with the pace of the workplace.
Basic vs Advanced Education
The emphasis on advanced education and higher education in corrections was
necessary to enable organizations to meet complex challenges. While there was a
strong movement in police departments requiring higher education, which increased
departments professionalism, the acceptance of advanced education in corrections is
not as strong.
Advanced education topics in criminal justice were primarily designed to address a
specific program, a specific problem and provided general information. Bass
(1990) suggested using education as part of a process to transform an organization to a
higher level of professionalism.
Basic correctional programs (basic academy and most higher education corrections
courses) have provided curricula on “how” to do specific tasks.Advanced training
must provide the “why” of the actions and those conditions that contributed to causing
the action to occur (Finckenaur, 2005).
Initial education requirements in corrections varied from department to department.
An officer in a small rural jail may have received a quick orientation, with little future
education. Efforts were made by corrections and sheriffs’ organizations to establish a
minimum 40 -hour initial education in all jails. Larger jails and prisons provided a 240-
640 hour basic academy, followed by a Corrections Training Officer (CTO) session
lasting from three days to 240 hours (Kerle, 2003).
If education at a basic academy can be counted for college credit at a community
college (associate level), could advancedcorrections education be provided at a higher
level (bachelor’s degree or graduate level) to enhance officer skills? The type of
education, the amount of education, the level of education and the usefulness of
advanced education in corrections have been debatable from several standpoints.
Some administrators felt the “Back to Basics” movement in advanced education was
necessary to resolve issues (Wilkinson, 2000); however some professionals contended
that most corrections officers were not able to advance past the basic level (except in
specialized unit education), therefore contributing to the problem (Virginia,1999, Office
of the Inspector General, 2004).
Inservice (traditional) vs online inservice training
While there is the need to provide traditional “hands on” classes on topics such as
self defense, firearms training, driver training, CPR, etc., online courses on advanced
topics are becoming more acceptable. Online courses provide more flexibility for the
officer, a means of providing different training methods and an more interactive
approach.
While traditional in service training has provided a good source of information to
the officers, the training is not always seen beneficial by the officers. Etter (2000)
found 20% of the study participants at Sedgwick County Sheriff Department (KS)
thought their needs were not met by traditional education methods, 29.9% felt they had
wasted their time at in-service education and 22.4% believed the education was not
relevant to their job. 23.4%of the participants felt traditional education methods did
not allow them to learn the material, 79.4% believed in-service education should be