Criminal Justice
The field of Criminal Justice is an ever-changing discipline that has recently swelled in importance within the United States. This is most likely due in fact to our alarmingly high recidivism and incarceration rate, which is currently towering above the rest of the countries of the world. With a problem of such a magnitude comes a multiplitude of solutions, each of which have varied from decade to decade. Until recently however, these solutions were typically designed to disregard the individual in favor of a more unilateral, streamlined process, which attempted to alleviate the pressure on the bloated Criminal Justice System, at the cost of the individual. All in all however, this was simply taking care of the symptoms instead …show more content…
Basically, it goes beyond what “feels right” and attempts to back up assertions with rigorous testing to verify the accuracy of the information. This notion of utilizing empirical data over unfounded “wisdom” is completely compatible with social work, it even specifically follows the NASW Code of Ethics 4.01c which requires “Social workers should base practice on recognized knowledge, including empirically based knowledge, relevant to social work and social work ethics”. Using these Evidence Based Practices, a social worker can find and remedy old systems that were based on speculation rather than research and prevent future incidents from occurring. Some of the more notable examples of Evidence Based Practices in Criminal Justice would be the usage of the “Risk/Need” assessment system and the usage of positive reinforcement in corrections. Despite the usage of these newer systems, there are still flaws of the old system that continue to rear their …show more content…
For example, say I was a social worker and I was presented with a child that was displaying deviant behaviors, I wouldn’t simply send the kid off to boarding school and go mini-golfing for the rest of the day. Rather, I would take my time to plan out a method of interacting with the child, using my expertise as well as information gleaned from respected studies, to find out what is causing these delinquent outbursts. What I would not want to do is assume that a fix for one child could work for another and rush this issue. From there I can use methods known to work and tailor them to the specific child, making sure to amend and research my errors as they arise. The end goal of Evidence Based Practice is not to simply brush the problems under the rug, like how the Criminal Justice System used to in the past, but rather find out what it causing these issues and correcting them
The field of Criminal Justice is an ever-changing discipline that has recently swelled in importance within the United States. This is most likely due in fact to our alarmingly high recidivism and incarceration rate, which is currently towering above the rest of the countries of the world. With a problem of such a magnitude comes a multiplitude of solutions, each of which have varied from decade to decade. Until recently however, these solutions were typically designed to disregard the individual in favor of a more unilateral, streamlined process, which attempted to alleviate the pressure on the bloated Criminal Justice System, at the cost of the individual. All in all however, this was simply taking care of the symptoms instead …show more content…
Basically, it goes beyond what “feels right” and attempts to back up assertions with rigorous testing to verify the accuracy of the information. This notion of utilizing empirical data over unfounded “wisdom” is completely compatible with social work, it even specifically follows the NASW Code of Ethics 4.01c which requires “Social workers should base practice on recognized knowledge, including empirically based knowledge, relevant to social work and social work ethics”. Using these Evidence Based Practices, a social worker can find and remedy old systems that were based on speculation rather than research and prevent future incidents from occurring. Some of the more notable examples of Evidence Based Practices in Criminal Justice would be the usage of the “Risk/Need” assessment system and the usage of positive reinforcement in corrections. Despite the usage of these newer systems, there are still flaws of the old system that continue to rear their …show more content…
For example, say I was a social worker and I was presented with a child that was displaying deviant behaviors, I wouldn’t simply send the kid off to boarding school and go mini-golfing for the rest of the day. Rather, I would take my time to plan out a method of interacting with the child, using my expertise as well as information gleaned from respected studies, to find out what is causing these delinquent outbursts. What I would not want to do is assume that a fix for one child could work for another and rush this issue. From there I can use methods known to work and tailor them to the specific child, making sure to amend and research my errors as they arise. The end goal of Evidence Based Practice is not to simply brush the problems under the rug, like how the Criminal Justice System used to in the past, but rather find out what it causing these issues and correcting them