Issue one of Practice: The New Zealand Corrections Journal includes:
- Editorial - Ray Smith
- An evidence-base for reducing re-offending - Dr Carolina C. Lukkien and Dr Peter W. Johnston
- Getting the balance right - Neil Beales
- The role of the Chief Probation Officer and the Practice Leadership Team - Darius Fagan and Astrid Kalders
- One size doesn’t fit all: reducing re-offending – a psychological perspective - Nikki Reynolds
- Case managers making a real difference - Sacha Thorby
- Why keep offenders’ secrets? The pros and cons of confidentiality - Jane Freeman-Brown
- Probation practice: twenty years on - Clare Ingram
- The right relationship - Lisa Young
- Working effectively with Mâori - Neil Campbell and Uarnie More
- Embedded literacy and numeracy - Rachel Bulliff
Editorial
Inviting innovation, encouraging professionalism
It gives me great pleasure to welcome you to the first issue of Practice: The New Zealand Corrections Journal, the new practice journal for staff and other professionals who work with offenders in New Zealand. This journal promotes and shares good practice with all those who work with offenders.
Some of you will be very familiar with journals like this one, some of you may have seldom, or never, picked one up. Yet all you need bring to this journal is the desire to be a true professional in your role, and a willingness to ‘go beyond the familiar’ when choosing which articles to read.
In fact, I hope you will read this journal cover-to-cover. I think you will be impressed by the range of knowledge and skill we have at Corrections. I also hope that as you read you will have your own ideas – and we will see even more innovation at Corrections as a result of sharing our practice in this way.
This first issue is intended to provide a smorgasbord of articles all of which illustrate the breadth and depth of knowledge and skills we are applying to the challenge of reducing re-offending. Corrections is committed to reducing re-offending by 25 percent by 2017. It is fitting therefore that the lead article in this first issue, by Carolina Lukkein and Peter Johnston, discusses how we actually measure 'what works' and the success of our efforts. The 'Three Chiefs', Chief Corrections Officer, Neil Beales, Chief Probation Officer, Darius Fagan and Former Chief Probation Officer, Astrid Kalders, and Chief Psychologist Nikki Reynolds introduce their roles and discuss the key themes of the work they are doing. Sarcha Thorby introduces the still-new role of case management via some case vignettes, and discusses the role of motivation in helping offenders change. Jane Freeman-Brown discusses the important concept of confidentiality in the work that psychologists carry out, while Clare Ingram charts the changes that have taken place in probation practice, the role of the Integrated Practice framework, dynamic risk assessment, and the Practice Leadership Framework. Lisa Young’s article discusses the 'right relationship' as a crucial element of corrections best practice.
Each issue of the journal will contain some special focus articles. In this issue Neil Campbell and Uarnie More write about involving whänau in the work being done in our new-look Mäori Focus Units. Rachel Bulliff discusses the benefits of embedding literacy and numeracy education in offender training and where this will take us next.
Each issue of Practice: The New Zealand Corrections Journal will offer a further opportunity for staff and others beyond Corrections to share ideas and promote best practice. If you have an idea for an article we would love to hear about it. Check out the information for contributors at the end of this issue.
Ray Smith
Chief Executive
Department of Corrections