Book Description

This handbook provides prison administrators and evaluators with information on how to best evaluate their objective classification systems to determine whether goals are being met, and if so, to what degree. This handbook offers guidance on the types of evaluations, how they should be designed and implemented, how data should be collected and analyzed, and how findings can be interpreted. Objective classification systems cover many areas, but this manual focuses on security and custody classification, because it is currently a central concern of corrections and criminal justice practitioners. However, the principles set forth apply equally to the evaluation of objective classification instruments in other areas. Chapter 1 introduces the importance of evaluating classification and reviews the most important studies conducted to date. Standards for conducting evaluations and ethical issues that must be considered in conducting research on human subjects are examined. Process and impact evaluations and validation are then briefly reviewed, along with data collection methods.