Enhancing Corrections Spaces & Cultures

The proposed BJA fellowship focuses Enhancing Corrections Spaces & Cultures with fellow Dr. Danielle S. Rudes of Sam Houston State University (SHSU). The fellowship period extends from June 1, 2022 through December 31, 2023. Dr. Rudes is requesting $271,480 for salary, data collection, travel expenses, podcast production, and an assistant for data collection and administrative support. Dr. Rudes proposed fellowship emphasizes working to support correctional agencies in developing and transforming jail/prison environments, physical spaces, and staff culture to assist residents in all institutional units with preparing for and successfully navigating reentry with particular attention to the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic. Dr. Rudes will also provide support to BJA’s corrections and reentry training and technical assistance (TTA) programs.

To accomplish the fellowship work, Dr. Rudes will first engage in qualitative data collection with staff and residents at a representative sample of U.S. prisons/jails to conduct interviews/observations regarding several focal areas including:  
1) environments/spaces (organizational structures, policies/practices/rules, and temporal locales); 2) cultures/social climates (interpersonal relationships, perceptions of morale, legitimacy, humane treatment); 3) COVID procedures, protocols, experiences; 4) training/TTA needs, and 5) preferred training modalities.  Dr. Rudes uses a semi-grounded-theory/inductive analysis to provide critical insight into current cultures/climates within U.S. carceral institutions. Deliverables from this step include a rich database and report with recommendations for transforming environments, spaces, and cultures, training materials, and presentations to academic and practitioner audiences. Next, Dr. Rudes will conduct a thorough review of existing BJA corrections resources using a well-documented framework. Dr. Rudes will create a gap map that compares the qualitative data on environment/climate/culture, COVID, needs, and modalities to compare against existing BJA trainings to see where new trainings need developing and where improvements/edits to existing trainings are necessary.

            Dr. Rudes is a 20+ year researcher and academic with a scholarly focus on corrections. She has a profound interest in researcher-practitioner partnerships that build on scientific knowledge and find innovative ways to disseminate and translate science to practitioner groups to collaboratively work to improve policy and practice. She is widely published in academic and translational journals and has a forthcoming book. She also received funding for 16 grants in a primary role totaling over $3.8 million—three via the BJA JAG program. She is currently PI on one core of a large NIDA-funded project where she creating trainings/eLearning tools to build capacity for scientists and practitioners working at the intersection of heath and justice.