Improving probation officer effectiveness through agency–university collaboration

Abstract

Collaborative research partnerships between criminal justice agencies and universities are vital to providing more effective and efficient services to the community by connecting research with practice. Unfortunately, such partnerships are not frequently sought. The tradition of autonomous research is often at least partially rooted in the perception that barriers to collaboration cannot be successfully mitigated. As external factors are increasing the pressure to collaborate, it is constructive to recognize the known barriers and strategies to overcome these hurdles. The present paper discusses an ongoing collaboration between the university researchers and a federal probation district in the assessment of an ongoing training program to improve officer interactions with offenders. Best practices are outlined and suggestions for future projects are discussed.

Keywords:

• collaborative research partnerships
• evidence-based practice evaluation
• probation supervision
• STARR

Acknowledgments

The authors would like to thank the three anonymous reviewers for their helpful comments on an earlier draft of this manuscript as well as the students and officers whose work made this project possible.

Notes

1. Space limitations prohibit extensive discussion about the research course for students. Authors are currently working on a manuscript describing the student-research aspect of the project and we hope this will be available to interested readers in the near future.