Innocence Projects, Work-Integrated Learning, and Student Career Pathways

Abstract

The Bridge of Hope Innocence Initiative (BOHII) at RMIT is an innocence project that has, since its inception in 2014, delivered an innovative and applied work-integrated learning (WIL) experience to students while raising public consciousness about errors in the criminal justice system. WIL internships are assumed to provide students with skills, competencies, and insights relevant to professional practice. This paper highlights the experiences and reflections of students who completed an internship within BOHII as either a core 50-day or elective 20-day WIL subject in their Criminology and Justice degree at RMIT University. The presentation of student reflections serves a dual purpose of demonstrating the need for more research into the pedagogical value of innocence projects and WIL in criminological and criminal justice settings in preparing students for the workplace. We outline the various contributions the BOHII placement has made to the students from their perspective, including the development of work-ready skills, self-efficacy and career path decision-making, with a particular focus on students who indicate policing as a preferred career path.

Keywords:

• Work integrated learning
• internships
• innocence projects
• criminology
• criminal justice

Introduction

The Bridge of Hope Innocence Initiative (BOHII) at RMIT is an innocence project that has, since its inception in 2014, delivered an innovative and applied work-integrated learning (WIL) experience to students while raising public consciousness about errors in the criminal justice system. BOHII is a multi-disciplinary, on-campus workplace that allows students to investigate claims of wrongful convictions. Alongside the investigations and exposure to the issue of wrongful convictions in Australia, students learn about ethics and professional communication, critical thinking, case analysis methodologies, resilience and self-care, providing authentic learning experiences and translatable work-ready skills.

BOHII is the only Australian innocence project created as an internship model for criminal justice and criminology students. While other similar projects are offered as WIL opportunities, they are usually only available as clinical legal education (for example, Griffith University Innocence Project; University of Toronto Externship Innocence Canada; California Western School of Law Innocence Project). The internship model within WIL is important in the context of criminological education. BOHII is an extension of a need within a criminology degree to provide core WIL components, which are primarily experienced as internships. However, recent research has acknowledged potential limitations to WIL offerings in criminology and criminal justice degrees (Murphy & Gibbons, 2017; Stichman & Farkas, 2005).

This paper highlights the experiences and reflections of students who participated in BOHII as a core WIL course within their Criminology and Justice degree at RMIT University. Although innocence projects within university settings have run for nearly 30 years, and the pedagogical importance has long been advocated, there is limited evidence of the outcomes and consequences of their educational influence (Hewitt, 2018; Hewitt & Owusu-Kwarteng, 2021; Ricciardelli, Bell, & Clow, 2011). University internships aim to teach values such as thoroughness, preparedness, and skepticism (Findley, 2006). However, their effectiveness in practice still needs to be explored regarding pedagogical success and workplace readiness.

Why WIL in criminology?

In Australia, most criminal justice and criminology degrees emerged in the 1990s, and there are now over 40 courses across Australian universities (Bartels, McGovern, & Richards, 2015). Like in the US, Australian criminal justice and criminology degrees were historically vocational in nature and provided training for current and future criminal justice professionals such as police, corrections officers, and cognate fields (Krimmel & Tartaro, 1999). While the vocational and practical focus of criminal justice degrees waned and has been contested, a resurgence in the need for criminology and criminal justice WIL in the current context has been driven from numerous perspectives. Broadly, the direction of global higher education policy has seen an emphasis on engaging and collaborating with business and government sectors which have influenced how degrees operate and the conditions in which academic knowledge, teaching, and learning exist (Stockdale & Sweeney, 2022). The shift can be considered a continuation of the increasing advancement of neoliberalism in the university sector globally centering on marketization (Bottrell & Manathunga, 2019), but also driven by student demand to increase the currency of their degrees toward employment (Lock & Kelly, 2020; Tomlinson, 2008), and employer demands for graduate employability (Owens & Stewart, 2016). In Australia, a ‘graduate-ready’ reframing of higher education was introduced within the 2011 Australian Qualifications Framework (AQF) which now requires that qualifications from Level 7 upwards (Bachelor degrees upward) to ensure graduates “will have broad and coherent knowledge and skills for professional work and/or further learning” (Australian Qualifications Framework (AQF), 2022). This was a reframing from the prior requirement to provide vague “interpersonal and teamwork skills appropriate to employment and/or further study” (AQF, 2007) and signalled an emphasis on professional work and skills within the university sector as part of the then Labor government’s education revolution.

To address this shift, many universities and degrees adopted models of WIL. WIL combines practice with traditional academic learning by exposing students to the ‘world-of-work’ in a chosen profession and aims to better prepare undergraduate students for the workforce (Jackson, 2015, p. 350). WIL emerges from a tradition of work-based learning (WBL), which refers broadly to learning situated in a workplace setting, often vocational, and reliant on arrangements between institution and workplace to ensure knowledge transfer through experience and professional development (for example, apprenticeships and on-the-job training) (Boud, Solomon, and Symes 2001; Lester & Costley, 2010). WIL expands on the premise of WBL, but typically represents a more formalised program of learning built into a degree for credit and designed to integrate academic learning objectives with work experience. In Australia, WIL in the form of practical placements or internship courses has become a central feature in higher education across many fields. WIL internship and placement courses allow students to work in a professional environment while ensuring their knowledge and skills developed in their degree are applied and effectively assessed. According to Cooper, Orrell, and Bowden (2010, p. 58) this type of WIL enables students to:

identify, develop and use theory to interpret, explain and intervene in the real world; affirm personal career choices and develop intrapersonal awareness; assume roles in which they must function as responsible members of society, contributing to their community; develop their interpersonal communication capabilities; learn the particular competencies and cultures of specific professions, industries, and community contexts.

In order to deliver work-ready graduates, universities are increasingly providing a synthesized model of ‘higher vocational education’ (Billett, 2009; Tynjälä, Välimaa, & Sarja, 2003). Key to this model are internships that embrace numerous pedagogical approaches (Butin, 2007; Penn, 2003) to foster links between academic work, community engagement, and experiential learning (Ross & Elechi, 2002).

Following the emergence of the criminal justice field, the ‘internship’, or ‘placement’ has been a regular mainstay of its curricula (Ross & Elechi, 2002; Thurgood, 2020). WIL internships are assumed to provide students with skills, competencies, and insights relevant to professional practice (Ryan, Toohey, & Hughes, 1996), as well as “providing significantly higher engagement and outcomes over students without WIL” (Australian Council for Educational Research, 2011). As the most extensive form of experiential learning used in criminology and criminal justice courses (Ross & Elechi, 2002), the internship also tends to be regarded as a reliable fit for the qualities inherent to these degrees (Bramford & Eason, 2021; Miller & Braswell, 1988; Parilla & Smith-Cunnien, 1997; Ross & Elechi, 2002).

Criminal justice students support this type of learning and perceive the opportunities to complete WIL as beneficial (Crandall, Buckwalter, & Witkoski, 2021; Ross & Elechi, 2002). As Cooper et al. (2010, p. 19) noted, “students want to find everyday relevance and practical applications in their studies for their life after graduation.” Students also link the opportunity to enhance career prospects. Hiller, Salvatore, and Taniguchi (2014, p. 10) surveyed criminal justice students at Temple University in the US and found that “students believed an internship would look good on their resume, help them acquire job-relevant skills; help them clarify what career they wanted, and enable them to network with individuals who could help them find a job.” These expectations are consistent with graduate outcomes, as while the impact of criminal justice and related WIL experiences on employment prospects in the field remains under-researched, criminal justice students are most often employed in the criminal justice sector following graduation (Hiller et al., 2014; Wimshurst & Allard, 2007). A survey of graduates of the Criminology and Criminal Justice School at Griffith University in Australia found that 97% of participants had found employment, with over 60% being employed in the criminal justice system (Wimshurst & Allard, 2007).

Offering WIL in the context of criminology and criminal justice is a complicated prospect because of the diversity of options available to graduates (Bartels et al., 2015) and the absence of benchmarking or consistency in curriculum across universities (Fishwick & Marmo, 2018). Wimshurst and Allard (2007) suggested that criminology schools should focus on student transition from university to the workforce. Similarly, Bates and Hayes (2017) highlighted that while WIL subjects in these degrees have a clear and linear field focus, the courses often fail to improve student understanding and navigation of the breadth of career pathways available. These suggestions are somewhat addressed by relying on WIL placements in governmental and nongovernmental criminal justice organizations to provide students with comprehensive practical experiences (Fishwick & Marmo, 2018, p. 105). However, consistency in approach across universities is difficult to generalize, with the options available to students varying from standard short-term internship electives to mandatory 50-day internships required to complete a degree (see RMIT, 2023), with varying support, assessment and engagement in preparing students for the workforce. Consequently, the impact of WIL in Australian criminal justice has been opaque, with few insights into how specific types of internships (and accompanying curricula) benefit students.

The BOHII model

BOHII is an on-campus simulated workplace offering unique opportunities for students to develop and apply transferable employability skills to real-world situations with tangible life-changing outcomes. Under the BOHII model, up to 45 students annually complete 20- or 50-day internships, contributing significantly more hours to wrongful conviction investigations than other projects that limit the student experience to shorter units of study. While the approach is resource intensive in a university setting, the BOHII model is succeeding because the workplace structure addresses well-recognized sectoral challenges of preparing work-ready graduates through authentic and accessible WIL and alleviates the risks of students’ inability to access suitable internships (Schuster & Glavas, 2017; Tertiary Education Quality and Standards Agency (TEQSA), 2022).

BOHII is staffed by academics in a Criminology and Justice school who act in dual roles as placement supervisors and academics, which means they can contextualize the students’ learning to their workplace experience in ways that other WIL providers cannot. Supervised by staff and student mentors, student interns assist with collecting case materials; searching for other case resources; liaising with witnesses, experts, and other parties; analyzing data; constructing chronologies; and producing reports. These activities provide useful touchpoints for staff to relate practice to theory and draw from academic and technical skills students have already acquired in their degrees. They also promote students’ immersion in the cases they investigate which supports the authenticity of their learning. BOHII’s methodologies require them to work through case materials that originated in a police investigation and follow the narrative of the case through the pre-trial, trial and appeal proceedings. Students also hear directly from the individuals who apply to BOHII for assistance, adding human and real-life dimensions to the case under investigation, particularly individuals still incarcerated.

Students gain a very practical understanding of the criminal justice system through their case investigations and from case outcomes which have included assisting legal teams with appeals, preparing and submitting submissions of petitions for mercy, and substantial media coverage of BOHII cases. Unlike other workplaces where students are usually situated in one setting, BOHII students gain an invaluable inside view of the criminal justice system and the roles of professionals in multiple settings: from police investigation to court proceedings, through to corrections and reintegration when incarcerated people begin to navigate parole and re-entry to the community.

The design of the BOHII WIL environment also emphasizes the development of students’ social-emotional and technical skills in preparation for the workplace. BOHII’s design is structured on the evidence that transformative WIL student experiences rely on strong and directed supervision (Billett, 2011). Informed by empirical research highlighting students’ desire to engage in real-life problem-solving (Crebert, Bates, Bell, Patrick, & Cragnolini, 2004) and emotional work readiness (Bandaranaike & Willison, 2015), BOHII interns are actively engaged in casework from the start of their internship, which is moderated by interaction with academic staff managing casework. This approach is supplemented by direct instruction to support the development of more technical work-ready skills and facilitates the students’ transformative learning (Van Schalkwyk et al., 2019). Additionally, BOHII students learn about translatable work-ready skills such as ethical procedures, professional communication, and critical thinking through more traditional workshops and seminars incorporated into their internships.

By focusing on skill development, BOHII embraces RMIT University’s role aligned with the priorities of the Australian Tertiary Education Quality and Standards Agency (TEQSA) and the Australian Qualifications Framework (AQF) for the delivery of tertiary education in Australia (TEQSA, 2022). In particular, BOHII addresses the aims of the current Australian government funding scheme, the National Priority and Industry Linkage Fund (NPILF), which incentivizes the delivery of ‘employability’ skills across all degrees, including soft skills such as critical thinking and working in teams (Department of Education, 2022).

Like most humanities and social science degrees, criminology degrees have leant heavily on critical thinking as the primary indicator of student learning. However, much of this is achieved through traditional teaching and assessment methods that make critical thinking a difficult and subjective measure. By reviewing and aiding people claiming wrongful convictions, BOHII extends students’ critical thinking and recognition of social realities related to crime and justice. These experiences follow Thurgood’s (2020, p. 28) assertion that a core criminological graduate attribute should be the ability to consider a range of behaviours and the structural elements that shape them to ensure their career trajectories create social beneficence. The critical application of criminological theory and concepts under the supervision of academic staff enables contextualization that fosters ‘deeper learning’ that transcends the varied outcomes of work experience to a greater likelihood of a transformative experience (Thurgood, 2020, p. 26).

Method

This paper highlights the experiences and reflections of students who completed an internship within BOHII as either a core 50-day or elective 20-day WIL course in their criminology and justice degrees. The approach serves dual purposes in addressing the need for more research into the pedagogical value of innocence projects and WIL in criminological and criminal justice settings. To date, most evaluation research into criminal justice internships has focused solely on their effects on student satisfaction and students’ attitudes towards their experiences (Murphy, Merritt, & Gibbons, 2013).

Criminology and Justice Studies (CJS) at RMIT is a large school offering several undergraduate and postgraduate degrees, including the Bachelor of Criminal Justice; the Bachelor of Legal and Dispute Studies; the Bachelor of Criminology and Psychology; the Bachelor of Justice and Criminology (Hons); and the Master of Justice and Criminology. Students exit to diverse careers in policing and law enforcement, courts, corrections, youth justice, government departments, and non-government organizations (see also Bartels et al., 2015). WIL has been deeply embedded in the Criminology and Justice Studies school for many years, building on long-standing industry recognition and engagement. Most students complete a compulsory 50-day supervised industry placement in their final year with opportunities to complete elective 20-day internships and WIL projects throughout their degrees.

Within the CJS discipline at RMIT University, students are presented with a critical examination of the criminal justice system and institutions. Throughout their undergraduate and postgraduate degrees, students are introduced to issues of miscarriages of justice and wrongful conviction as regular topics in multiple criminology and socio-legal subjects, as well as in an elective titled ‘Miscarriages of Justice’ (JUST2339). Across these courses, all students in the discipline are exposed to concepts and factors that lead to miscarriages of justice within Australian and international criminal justice systems. This learning equips future BOHII interns to recognise the importance of the work and merits of their placement. The data sourced in this project were reflective student assessments submitted by BOHII interns as part of their undergraduate or postgraduate WIL subjects (HWSS2181 Justice and Legal Internship; HWSS2156/2186 Professional Internship; JUST2312 Justice Research Project) completed within one of RMIT University’s CJS degrees. Each WIL subject has similar learning outcomes ascribed to their delivery that address core competencies aligned with the AQF requirements. The subject learning outcomes include:

• Analyze and critique professional practice in an organization relevant to the justice sector and your career interests;

• Explain the organizational structure of the organization and the role and function of employees working in the area;

• Identify good teamwork principles and practices and group dynamics;

• Critique the OH&S practices of the organization;

• Critically reflect on theories, approaches and research informing practice in the organization;

• Demonstrate newly acquired skills resulting from the experience of professional practice;

• Demonstrate effective interpersonal and communication skills;

• Self-appraise your performance in professional practice and critically examine factors that shape your professional identity.

One hundred student reflective assessment pieces submitted between 2018 and 2021 were collected, de-identified and thematically coded in NVIVO, a data analysis software that assists in the organization, coding, categorization, and qualitative analysis of data. In these assessments, students were asked to identify the skills and experiences they had or hoped to develop during the internship subject, reflect on whether and how their prior studies have influenced their internship, and discuss if and how their career aspirations had changed. As a reflective assessment, students also offered insights into their perceptions of their work readiness, preparedness, and employability at the time of completing their WIL experience in their degree at RMIT University. The assessment pieces were thematically coded for broad observations about the students’ WIL experience within BOHII, how the experience aligned with their subject learning outcomes, and emergent themes such as work readiness, preparedness, and transformative experience.

Findings: alignment with the course and degree objectives

Students completing a placement within BOHII outlined the benefits of balancing learning and experience in WIL-settings. In their reflections, students identified the development of work-ready skills, hinted towards self-efficacy and reflected on their career path decision-making. Acknowledging these findings, the remainder of this paper is structured into three sections: skill development and professional practice, career trajectories, and realigned trajectories. The latter section provides insight by focusing on students who indicate policing as a preferred career path and how their WIL experiences have informed their career aspirations.

Skill development and professional practice

In line with AQF, each WIL subject requires students to demonstrate development in workplace skills and professional practice. The subject outcomes acknowledge the need for students to display a range of work-ready skills from identifying good teamwork principles to demonstrating newly acquired skills resulting from professional practice (see Justice and Legal Internship Course Guide: http://www1.rmit.edu.au/courses/044506). In analysing student reflections, we identified how students recognise the value of WIL in enabling the development of general skills such as written and verbal communication, critical thinking, problem-solving, teamwork, research and intelligence gathering, IT skills and the use of Microsoft programs. For example, the following excerpt is indicative of student perceptions of the value of these skills in preparing them for the workplace:

Every task we did has helped me build skills that will help in the workplace. This includes morning meetings, where each day a different intern was responsible for compromising [sic] the notes and running the meeting, building my confidence, and writing skills. I also learnt how to work with confidential information and deal with sensitive materials, and how this protects not only the integrity of the workplace but also the applicants and their cases.

Student reflections used in the study highlighted how these skills were supplementary to the skills developed through their university education. The primacy placed on WIL experiences in skill development was highlighted by students who emphasised specific skills aligned with their work within the innocence project. For example one student explained:

I learnt a lot of skills that I believe will be useful for a career in the criminal justice field - especially skills that are not taught at university including transcribing calls, filling out paperwork and the general lingo used.

In addition to these skills, other students identified a diverse range of specific skills including how to request material from applicants, submit Freedom of Information requests, requesting materials from lawyers, and seeking information from government organizations.

As with many university degrees, the practice of teamwork principles and group dynamics are also recognized in the subject learning outcomes and the emphasis on these skills is highlighted throughout the BOHII students’ reflections. As one student acknowledged:

I also learnt basic workplace skills such as teamwork - what to do if someone in your team is not pulling their weight and how you should go about a situation like this.

The recognition of teamwork as a skill in these findings aligns with the understanding that WIL can develop skills in an effective way. Where teamwork and group dynamics are often purported within academic settings, practising these within a working environment supervised by academic staff enables students to learn with the support and reflection that align with Billett’s (2011) suggestions for effective curriculum and pedagogic practices via WIL.

The findings in these reflections demonstrate how BOHII placements align with previous research that has acknowledged that criminology and criminal justice internships provide students with the opportunity to practice learned concepts from their studies while also exposing students to develop other career skills (George, Lim, Lucas, & Meadows, 2015). With BOHII established as a workplace within a university setting with academic mentorship, the translation of work skills is a training focus and is highlighted throughout students’ reflections. The ability to demonstrate skills developed throughout the degree in combination with specific investigation skills required to examine claims of innocence were highlighted through the reflections:

My internship required me to employ and develop my analytical skills which needed to be precise and thorough. The nature of the work BOHII conducts means attention must be paid to small details and information must be processed thoroughly and precisely to ensure we had a complete understanding of the case at hand. I believe in whatever career path I choose this ability to analyze, condense and problem solve using available information will benefit me.

Common responses within student reflections were recognition of student development of more abstract concepts and skills such as analytical thinking, problem-solving, and critique. These recognize the broader outcomes situated within the degree in terms of the AQF but also demonstrate how an internship can develop self-efficacy through the practice within a work environment. As one student explained:

I found this placement experience very helpful. I was very worried and anxious before starting placement that I didn’t have the skills to complete it, let alone have the skills and experience to enter the workforce. However, the placement opportunity helped calm my worries as it proved to me that I am more than capable to enter the workforce.

Reflections like this see an emergent workplace self-efficacy (Bandura, 1986) where students recognize skills and abilities through work practice. Self-efficacy has long been associated as a key element within WIL programs, as it allows students to develop “judgment of their capabilities to organize and execute courses of action required to attain designated types of performances” (Bandura, 1986, p. 391). Central to achieving self-efficacy is the combination of knowledge, skills, and action through a self-referential thought between them. BOHII internships allow students to develop self-efficacy while progressing casework by offering a supervised and supportive framework encouraging learning.

Reflections on self-efficacy often form during the recognition of the broad array of experiences BOHII exposes students to. For example, one student acknowledges the benefits and expansion of their abilities because of their experience:

Gaining such knowledge and experience in the investigation field will aid my career within the criminal justice system. I have been exposed to and now understand how to read and potentially draft case materials as well as building resilience to sensitive materials. This placement has given me the ability to enhance my investigative skills and enable me to think outside the box in terms of where to look for evidence and what to look for. It has taught me to investigate all possible avenues and look closely at every bit of evidence, as something that seems insignificant can lead to major breakthroughs. Even the exposure of working in a team through the investigative process and being able to bounce ideas off each other in this environment is a unique experience, that you may not gain solely from part-time work or through university. These are all skills that will complement my career.

The identification of self-efficacy also reflects a broader conceptualization of WIL as a sight of building social capital within students through skill building and recognizing opportunity. As the previous student comment highlights, some students can complete a degree but remain anxious or unaware of their capabilities and capacity to enter the workforce. The production of self-efficacy and social capital is particularly important considering the evidence linking social disadvantage with negative impacts on student experience and their entry into the labor market (O’Sullivan, Robson, & Winters, 2019). By offering an academically supervised workplace, BOHII helps address these potential concerns in two ways. First, by offering strategic supervision to ensure translation of prior knowledge into practice, and secondly, through instruction and ‘professional development’ sessions within the placement on how to translate internship experience to develop and mobilize social and personal capital in the search for employment (Lehmann, 2019). This represents a focus on the need for students to develop self-efficacy and confidence in the skills developed throughout their degree and WIL experiences. Student confidence is linked with their self-efficacy as a reinforcement of ability and recognition of their belonging within fields or as practitioners (Pool & Sewell, 2007). Confidence in recognizing one’s abilities is a crucial outcome of WIL experiences, especially considering the past misperception of the role of self-efficacy in skill development and teamwork within university settings (Crebert et al., 2004).

Career trajectories

The theme of student trajectories post-internship was a focus of most student reflections. This is consistent with both the framing students receive from universities promoting degrees as a platform to be ‘job ready’ and the increasing desire of students for a degree to place them favorably in the job market (Tomlinson, 2008). Our research found that many students come into their WIL experience with BOHII with predetermined career goals or, alternatively, hope that their placement experience will point them in the right direction. For example, one student noted:

I have always hoped my degree would help point me in a career direction, as all I knew was, I had a passion for helping people and an interest in the justice system.

Some students with predetermined ideas found that their placement experience confirmed their choices:

[M]y placement experience has reassured me that my future career plan of being a case manager remains accurate and in line with my expectations and goals.

Before my placement I was undecided between wanting to work in corrections or law. If anything, this placement has helped me confirm that I am wanting to pursue a career in law. This way I still will get to work with evidence briefs and perform small scale investigations.

Given the greater emphasis within their degrees on concepts which often lead to critical perspectives of the criminal justice system and innocence projects’ histories of exposing flaws in the system, the potential trajectories of BOHII WIL students in their transitions to the workforce is a site of importance.

While innocence projects like BOHII critique policing practices and advocate policing policy reform, a somewhat counterintuitive trend among students completing BOHII internships has been a readiness to pursue a career in policing. Many students interested in pursuing policing upon graduating are attracted to BOHII for its investigative nature and the potential to learn about policing methods. Perhaps surprisingly, given the context of the contemporary critique of policing within criminology, the presentation of defund policing arguments within the degree, and the role of policing as an issue within wrongful convictions, several responses identified the reinforcement of students’ desire to seek careers in policing. For example, two students reflected on this position explaining:

Working with Victoria Police for investigations has continued to be my career goal prior and post placement as I want to help the community and protect them from harm. The majority of police are law-abiding and ethical officers, however only the negatives are focused on in these cases. This has informed me of the correct and incorrect procedures associated with investigating cases and ensuring that the people involved are being treated fairly. Further, this placement has confirmed my interest in investigations, in particular homicide squad and has even introduced me to the possibility of working for the SOCIT [Sexual Offences and Child Abuse Investigations] team.

This placement has prepared me for Victoria Police more than any other placement I could have taken part in. By looking into real cases and gaining a more in-depth understanding of the justice system and the role of police within a case, I have a greater understanding of the role I will play and how to be effective within that role. This placement offered a perspective of the justice system that is not widely available. Specifically for the police force, highlights how important it is to complete a job to the best of your ability, ensuring all procedures are followed and all leads are explored.

We found that two primary drivers highlighted the trajectories of BOHII students in their plan to seek positions within policing. The first rests on their established trajectory prior to the internship (see above) and the social capital built during their placement reinforcing their desires. This is demonstrated through students identifying the building of skills and understanding of ‘how the system works and fails’ that will embolden them to succeed in the organization to benefit the broader community (see investigations skills, rigor etc.). This finding links to prior research that has acknowledged that, compared to generalist degrees in humanities and social sciences, students selecting criminal justice degrees tend to accept a status quo understanding of how the world works (King, 2015). This also occurs in a context where criminology as a field of study has historically been slow to adopt shifts in theory and practice from outside of the field (Garland & Sparks, 2000). With this said, recent criminological awakenings have seen social justice perspectives critical of criminal justice systems such as abolition, decolonization, Southern Theory, and others presented as core learning within criminology degrees in Australia (Burns, Loney-Howes, Wood, & Iliadis, 2023; Fishwick & Marmo, 2018). Considering these trends, we view the students’ pursuit of a career as merging social justice orientations and social change embedded within degree and student orientations towards employment.

The second theme on policing trajectories focused on reinforcement but extended it with the desire to improve a system rather than remove their participation within it. While these perspectives may clash with orientations offered within degrees, it does reinforce government and university requirements to prepare students with the skills and awareness needed to work in the ‘new’ criminal justice system (Hummer & Byrne, 2021). Throughout the multitude of police-orientated trajectories, students reflected on the requirement of integrity, ethics, and avoiding bias in their professional practice to ensure justice. For example, multiple students reflected on addressing systemic issues within organizations:

This insight into wrongful convictions has strengthened my desire to pursue a career in policing at the AFP [Australian Federal Police]. I want to take ownership of some of the errors policing organizations have made in the past and work towards correcting them.

The placement has made me evaluate what I want from a job while BOHII has made me question policing practices and their true intentions as an organization, it has motivated me to continue to want to pursue a job in the field and try to be an agent of change. The BOHII internship has taught me the importance of being transparent as a police officer and the impact of unintentional and intentional biases can have on someone’s life.

These reflections are indicative of the structure of BOHII as a campus workplace supervised by academic staff and how the unique opportunity of investigating possible miscarriages of justice influences their career trajectories. The reinforcement of policing trajectories and the desire to be ethical practitioners for some students highlights the potential positive effect of the internship. These findings align with the recognition that higher education has a positive influence on reducing police officer misconduct (Rydberg & Terrill, 2010). Student trajectories towards policing that were reinforced by their experiences in BOHII were supported across other student reflections surrounding desired trajectories towards working in corrections, case management, and law ("this placement has helped me confirm that I am wanting to pursue a career in law").

This is not to say that students who continue trajectories towards policing somehow have less transformative experiences than others. Here, transformative experiences can include exposure to concepts, ideas, and situations that students otherwise would not gain access to. In BOHII, this often means a progression from critique of the justice system in ‘theory’ towards recognition of the fallibilities and problems of the system in practice. For some students aspiring to become police officers, the transformative experience of BOHII is not only found in the casework, but also in the exposure to the happenings within cases and police investigation:

I feel like my eyes have been truly opened to some of the worst aspects of the criminal justice system. I am particularly aware of the failure of police men and women in doing their job correctly and how this can have drastic ramifications for another person. Knowing these pitfalls, I believe that I would contribute better to a policing workplace and am more aware of how my actions in the job can affect others.

The exposure to both the experiences of the wrongfully convicted and the actions of the criminal justice system is a unique experience to innocence projects. In combination with supervision within the internship, students are provided with options and insight that extend beyond the standard development of skills and etiquette on worksites, towards transformational experiences of their career trajectory and their place in the workforce.

However, it is not uncommon for students who have participated in BOHII to be in two minds about applying to the police force - either as uniformed officers or in an ‘unsworn’ role - by the injustices they have witnessed:

With current world events such as the disgusting actions of police officers resulting in the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis and the assault of an Indigenous Australian in Sydney, it has made me re-evaluate my career goals to work in law enforcement and my experience with the BOHII so far has defiantly [sic] influenced this evaluation.

I was considering working for Victoria Police, while only slightly, my work with BOHII exposed me to injustices that occur in police work and may have turned me towards other career ideals. It also posed the question that if I were to work for Victoria Police, what kind of officer would I be? Ultimately, my placement experience has made me more mindful of the work that I could be contributing to in the future.

Realigned trajectories

Students who noticed their career trajectories shift due to the transformative workplace experience were perhaps more aligned with the social justice expectations and outcomes of BOHII’s work. One key outcome for some organizations in enabling internships is the opportunity to present students with work that challenges stereotypes and preconceived ideas about particular service user groups (Bramford & Eason, 2021). Internships like those offered by BOHII extend this opportunity to address potential stereotypes of those suffering from a wrongful conviction and the organizations that impart harm towards them.

Some students who identified themselves as potentially on police career trajectories identified the transformative influence of their innocence project experience. One student, for example, recognized a significant shift away from a desire for a specific criminal justice career, noting:

Originally, when undertaking Bachelor of Criminal Justice, I wanted to apply for the police force however, my career goals have changed while undertaking my placement and now I would love to work with the Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS) helping disadvantaged women who do not have the same opportunities as other women … My placement helped me understand what I really wanted to do as there are so many people who are unable to help themselves as they may not have the privilege or understanding due to factors such as socioeconomic status, education level or social group.

This statement indicates many students who, while enrolling and completing criminology and criminal justice degrees, recognize the alternative approaches to assist and achieve justice outside the justice system. Similar to this example, these students’ trajectories toward policing or corrections were often realigned toward the Department of Health and Human Services or non-government organizations assisting vulnerable and marginalized populations who are over-represented in the experience of the innocence project (see Stratton & Sigamoney, 2023).

The trajectory shift can be identified because of the WIL experience within the innocence project. It is common for students to recognize the transformative element of their experience. The student whose career objectives shifted to assisting ‘disadvantaged women’ clarified that:

without experiencing my placement and the tasks that came along with it my future goals may have resulted in being unchanged and not know what I truly want to do, the thought of working for the DHHS truly excites me with possibilities to come which were before unseen and unnoticed to myself.

Another student expressed that this desire was cultivated during their internship, where they

developed a passion for trying to make a change with wrongful convictions in Australia’s criminal justice system. Alongside working with marginalized and minority groups in Australia at risk of entering the criminal justice system.

The desire to work toward social change and justice demonstrates the building of social capital and navigational capacity. A perspective encouraged throughout criminology and criminal justice degrees, the experience within an innocence project exposes students to opportunities rarely afforded within standard placements that are often office or policy focused. As one student noted, "learning of the lived experiences of applicants and the sensitive issues they encountered whilst imprisoned" can shift student trajectories from criminal justice towards broader horizons of social justice. This shift enables exposure to diverse perspectives and experiences that allow students greater mobility in career choices outside of criminal justice institutions that they may deem more ethical or in line with a just society.

Conclusion

The design and approach that BOHII brings to WIL experiences demonstrate how criminology education can open possibilities for students to take advantage of the transferable skills developed throughout the degree. Where the most common route for criminology students is to pursue a career in criminal justice-related occupations, the ability to research and critique data, communicate complex ideas and work as part of a team are highly sought skills across a range of fields. By offering a structured WIL experience, programs like BOHII can build student capacity towards post-graduate employment following criminal justice and other trajectories.

BOHII’s approach addresses many critiques and failings of WIL by offering a pedagogical focus on education and justice (Findley, 2006, p. 245). BOHII internships, when placed in the broader context of practical experience that encourages critical reflection, are important in developing criminology students who are more deeply considerate of their experiences and fulfil more meaningful learning. This success is expressed through student recognition of the skills developed, self-confidence and self-efficacy, and recognition of their career trajectories due to their experiences within BOHII.

The students that BOHII works with come from diverse educational backgrounds and bring different life experiences and educational journeys to the program. BOHII compliments their journey by facilitating learning through focused mentoring and support based on a strength-based approach. Guidance from expert and experienced staff who are passionate about their work can provide support and opportunities for students to develop as people, critical thinkers, and future professionals. A strength of the approach used at BOHII is the structure of the intervention and the support provided to students. Students can explore their interests and concerns by examining the impacts of law and policy on issues they are most passionate about.

To allow students from diverse backgrounds to succeed in the current environment, criminology degrees have been required to develop career preparedness for the wider variety of career paths available to students (Bartels et al., 2015; Thurgood, 2020; Wimshurst & Allard, 2007). With these pressures, BOHII ensures graduates are equipped with the necessary skills and knowledge for life beyond the university while also gaining the critical knowledge a criminology degree provides (Jameson, Strudwick, Bond-Taylor, & Jones, 2012). Where the likes of Garland (2011) have criticized the vocational shift within criminology education, government targets and policy changes incentivizing higher education enrollments have increased pressures on universities and criminology schools. This has brought opportunities for diverse and representative student populations who provide a wealth of benefits to the university experience. However, it has also increased the responsibility of addressing student aspirations of social mobility, career trajectories, as well as learning and knowledge. Programs like BOHII provide an opportunity to quell the concerns of academic dilution with practical measures that address the needs and desires of students by offering practical measures to ensure students a trajectory toward employment.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).