Building trauma informed jails

I don't know if this will help or not but checking with the Vera institute may be helpful and yesterday Samantha (I think) had a blog about education in a California jail. I think anything that seeks to educate and not just subjugate is leaning towards trauma informed. http://www.vera.org/news/natio...lay-context=newsroom

Thanks Tina

Might check:

Insight Prison Project http://www.insightprisonproject.org/

<cite>www.rsat-tta.com/files/webinars/Trauma-Informed-Correctional-Care</cite>

The Rebecca Project for Justice http://www.rebeccaprojectjustice.org

At a recent conference in France I met a woman named Paula who is a social worker in the largest jail in Dublin, Ireland and doing quite interesting trauma-informed work there.  The only contact information I have is an email address for another organization with which she is associated: info@suicideorsurvive.ie

 

Best wishes for a successful connection.

Google:  Creating a Place of Healing and Forgiveness: The Trauma-Informed Care Initiative at the Women's Community Correctional Center of Hawaii

3 online full length documentaries of introducing Vipasssana meditation in prisons: (YouTube)

Doing Time Doing Vipassana (Tihar, India)

Changing From the Inside (Seattle Women's Rehabilitation)

Dhamma Brothers (Alabama men's prison)

 

I am currently looking at data from the Alabama prison to assess efficacy of Vipassana meditation in prison populations to improve emotional regulation, mood disorders, anger, stress levels, coping skills, etc. 

 

Washington state has done some studies with juvenile facilities.  You could contact the Office of Juvenile Justice for more information.

I am so excited by how ACEsConnect works.  So many people sharing ideas!! Wonderful!!!!!

These came up doing a search...

How Prison Architecture Can Transform Inmates' Lives

http://www.psmag.com/politics-...s-crime-design-82968

 

How Architects can Improve Justice facilities

(Deanna) Van Buren believes that a criminal justice culture that has not shifted its focus from punitive treatment to rehabilitation is a significant obstacle. Van Buren is looking for alternative architectural typologies to support rehabilitation, such as peacemaking centers, restorative justice centers, and re-entry campuses. Her method involves working directly with the people living and working within justice facilities to explore the idea of restorative justice as a process of acknowledging crimes committed and reacquainting oneself with normative behavior.

Van Buren has been working with Barb Toews, a Lancaster, Pa.–based social worker and restorative justice practitioner, to explore how social justice concepts may play out inside of jails. Specifically, the team has looked at how design can draw rehabilitative elements of therapy closer to the incarcerated individual’s daily life.

http://www.aia.org/practicing/AIAB104773

 

ACE Overcomers has a 12 week program that is used in a central California county jail with exciting results.

See www.aceovercomers.org or email me at aceovercomers@sbcglobal.net

 

 

 

My perspective is based on relieving pain and other symptoms in ACE survivors. A core concept is helping people view their ACEs as a source of pride for what they have overcome instead of as a source of shame. A corollary concept is recognition that they are not at fault for what happened. I will often explain to my patients that they were "born on the far side of Mt Everest but made it to the other side" which provides a new mental image for this way of thinking about the early adversity. Many will still struggle to recognize the magnitude of what they have overcome until I ask them to imagine a child they care about forced to go through a similar experience. That often clarifies how heroic they were to survive. The resulting improvement in self-esteem is a key foundation for numerous positive life changes that follow. I suspect people who are incarcerated would benefit from these concepts as much as my patients do and would recommend they be considered for your program.

Hope this is helpful,

David D Clarke, MD
President, Psychophysiologic Disorders Association
www.ppdassociation.org
www.stressillness.com

Don Caballero,

     While Robert J. Obenland was with the National Clearinghouse on Criminal Justice Planning and Architecture-at the University of Illinois/Champaign-Urbana, he helped develop the National Standards for New Prison Construction and Programming, before the advent of "Trauma-Informed". He's also written other publications such as "Post-Construction Design Evaluation of [public] Elderly Housing. If "Googling" his name doesn't bring up any helpful information, the National Clearinghouse... may.