NCJ Number
187041
Journal
Journal of Correctional Education Volume: 51 Issue: 4 Dated: December 2000 Pages: 316-319
Date Published
2000
Length
4 pages
Annotation
This paper describes and reports on the evaluation of Operation Outward Reach (OOR), a nonprofit Pennsylvania program that provides community-based vocational training in carpentry and masonry for inmates in five prisons in the western part of the State.
Abstract
OOR has completed over 1,150 projects that have typically involved roofing, siding, porches, and other home-repair tasks; over 60 percent of the projects have benefited low-income senior citizens and poor rural families. In the early 1990's, OOR received a demonstration grant from the U.S. Department of Education, part of which required a third-party evaluation. Part of the evaluation compared two cohorts of OOR completers with control groups, yielding findings that indicate the program's impact on recidivism. The evaluation covered a 5-year period. A "blind" technique was used to ensure the selection of a control group that closely matched the experimental group. Groups of matching size and characteristics were analyzed for significance by using chi-square. The experimental group outperformed the control groups in recidivism for each of the 5 years, leaving little doubt that the program was the difference. For the combined five cohorts, 243 of 323 of the experimental subjects (75 percent) had positive outcomes; for the control subjects, 189 of 319 (59 percent) scored as pluses. The percentage differences in recidivism outcomes between the two groups averaged 16 percent per year. Using Pennsylvania State figures on costs and multiplying the number "saved" by number of years, at the 7-year incarceration average cost, the OOR program saved the State approximately $5.8 million over the 1990-97 period, approximately 1.6 times the total cost of the OOR program. If social costs (estimated in a recent study to be from 100 percent to 120 percent of incarceration costs) are factored in, the savings are well over three times the program cost. 2 references