A methodology to evaluate the effectiveness of educational components in juvenile detention facilities---A link in transition back into the community

The criminal justice and education system would appear to have opposing if not contradictory functions in democratic society, the first to protect society from wrong doing and punish wrongdoers and the second to positively enhance individual growth and social development. Critics of juvenile detention highlight the extent to which rehabilitation and support activities are subordinated to discipline and management. This thesis starts from this normative presumption that detention can and should support the juvenile offender's transition back into the community and asks, "How effective are educational components in juvenile detention facilities?" from this vantage. My approach was to develop a research model designed to answer this question by measuring the degree to which time in school and 'idle time" are used to meet the goals of control vs. rehabilitation.;This research hopes to add to a growing dialogue on the significance of "short-term placement" in a continuum to reentry into the community for youth most at-risk of educational failure and of becoming repeat offenders. The aim is to: (1) express that protection and control are the goals of juvenile detention; (2) provide a useable empirical model to classify detention programs according to their orientation; and, (3) show how application of this model could be used to reorient educational programming and the programming of 'idle time' in detention to transitional support and rehabilitation. I devised a BLE index to classify program activities according to whether time in detention contributes to a broader learning environment or to control; and finally, I suggest how the BLE index could be applied to help juvenile detention better reflect the goals of transition and rehabilitation.;Efficient use of time while in detention is a central point of this study. What needs to change is the presumption that the only purpose of detention is "to ensure the youth appears for all court hearings and to protect the community from future offending." This position shortchanges any opportunity to develop programs from a reentry frame of mind. Detention is a major stop in the juvenile justice cycle. The methodology used to create a BLE, was designed to enable accountability measures to evaluate educational components in juvenile detention.