Summary
Youth in correctional facilities experience a broad range of educational, psychological, medical, and social needs. Professional development, a systemic process that improves the likelihood of student success by enhancing educator abilities, is a powerful way to positively affect student outcomes in correctional settings. This article offers a professional development framework designed for the juvenile justice system. It includes information on the background and purpose of professional development, and provides the structure, objectives and components necessary to achieve a capacitybuilding professional development model in correctional education settings. In addition, examples of the National Center on Education, Disability, and Juvenile Justice (EDJJ) professional development activities, including piloting of professional development modules in a site are discussed. The article concludes with recommendations for future applications of the proposed framework.
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Extract
Professional Development: A Capacity-Building Model for Juvenile Correctional Education Systems
Correctional educators frequently struggle to provide the best possible education and rehabilitation to the youth in their care. In addition to the institutional challenges inherent to any correctional setting, such as complicated systems of oversight, high staff turnover, a shortage of resources, difficulties obtaining educational records, and the competing priorities of education and security (Griller, 1998; Robinson Q Rapport, 1999; Rutherford, Griller-Clark, B Anderson, 2001), the needs of the youth themselves impose unique demands on educators. Youth in correctional facilities experience a wide range of educational, psychological, medical, and social needs. More than a third exhibit significant learning and/or behavioral problems that entitle them to special education and related services (Baltodano, Harris, & Rutherford, 2005; Quinn, Rutherford, Leone, Osher, & Poirier, 2005; Rutherford, Quinn, Poirer, & Garfinkel, 2002). Many are either marginally literate or illiterate, and most have experienced school failure and retention (National Center on Education, Disability, and Juvenile Justice, 2005). Clearly, these variables pose special challenges for correctional educators struggling to find the most effective ways to teach and rehabilitate their students.
While correctional educators do continually search for new ways to address the academic and social behavioral requirements of detained or incarcerated students, the possibilities offered by appropriate and ongoing professional development in these settings are often overlooked. Elrod and Ryder (1999) point out that many professionals in corrections have not had access to the training needed to perform their jobs well - and indeed, many of the teachers, administrators, and other correctional professionals entering ...See the full content of this document
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