Demonstration site coaches provide guidance on effective strategies to meet the goals and objectives as proposed in the sites' grant applications. The coaches provide the sites with a direct link to the National PREA Resource Center.
Please check the box next to the following questions if the answer is 'yes'.
Please enter the applicable Event Date if there is an Event associated with this TTA.
When entering an Event Date, the Time is also required.
If the TTA is targeted to a particular audience or location, please complete the questions below.
Milestones are an element, activity, work product, or key task associated with completing the TTA (e.g. kick-off meeting, collect data from stake holders, deliver initial data analysis).
Please complete the fields below, if applicable, to create a milestone for this TTA.
PRC TTA coaching staff initiated outreach via e-mail correspondence to this grant site's designated point of contact to coordinate and schedule a conference call. A call was held on March 27, 2015 with the Virginia DOC team for the purpose of identifying their training and technical assistance needs and determining how the PRC can best support this site's implementation of their grant. During this call, the PRC TA coaches reviewed the key program aspects of the grant and asked clarifying questions about site-specific priorities and implementation challenges. This needs assessment process will help the PRC TTA coaching staff to better understand the range of proposed activities and to identify core technical assistance needs shared across multiple sites. This process will also inform the development of a TTA plan for the BJA FY '14 PREA demonstration grant sites. The PRC TTA coaches also described the range of materials and support available to the agency.
On December 22, 2015 the PREA Coach, Peg Ritchie, conducted a quarterly conference call with the Wisconsin Department of Corrections staff to discuss updates on the Goals and Objectives for their grant. The main focus of the grant is to develop a more comprehensive approach to PREA implementation. They have completed the development and revision of curricula for staff, volunteers, contractors, and inmates and continue training on the revisions. The curricula for staff, volunteers and contractors is online and interactive at this time. They have used their mock audits as an opportunity to complete the objective related to random samples of staff, volunteers and contractors as a means to pre and posttest their PREA knowledge of these positions/roles. They have designed and are piloting gender responsive risk assessments for males and females and plan to eventually validate the instruments. During the PRC Field Training site visit Josh Delany and Marion Morgan provided some guidance for the weighted scores within the instruments. The Psychologist position is vacant and they have expanded the types of professionals that can apply for the position; this position will continue the development and assessing of the risk assessment instruments. They have posted the position. Ms. Preston is developing a working group early in 2016 to move the risk assessment process forward. I recommended that a researcher be a part of this team as that person can assist in setting up a validation study of their instruments. The Data Analyst positon is filled. Fifteen objectives were reviewed; many could be combined. Ten (10) of the fifteen objectives have been met. Primary efforts are now related to data integration and analysis as well as the system wide implementation of the risk assessment tools.
Wisconsin Department of Corrections
March 29, 2016
Quarterly Coaching Update
Attendees: Christine Preston, State PREA Director, Leigha Weber, PREA Program and Policy Analyst, Advanced, and Peg Ritchie, PRC Coach
On March 29, 2016 the PREA Coach, Peg Ritchie, conducted a quarterly conference call with the Wisconsin Department of Corrections staff to discuss updates on the Goals and Objectives for their grant. The main focus of the grant is to develop a more comprehensive approach to PREA implementation. They have designed and are piloting gender responsive risk assessments for males and females and plan to eventually validate the instruments. The Psychologist position is still vacant and they have expanded the types of professionals that can apply for the position; this position will continue the development and assessing of the risk assessment instruments as the pilot data comes in for analysis. Ms. Preston is developed a working group early in 2016 to move the risk assessment process forward. I recommended that a researcher be a part of this team as that person can assist in setting up a validation study of their instruments. The Data Analyst positon is filled. Fifteen objectives were reviewed; many could be combined. Twelve (12) of the fifteen objectives have been met. Primary efforts are now related to data integration and analysis as well as the system wide implementation of the risk assessment tools. The coach reviewed their Risk Assessment documents and provided feedback to Ms. Weber. They plan on sending the Assessment Instrument out to all facilities within a week. Each institution will assign a nurse, psychologist or social worker to do the intake. Classification staff may have a role, but this is not determined to date. The psychologists were trained some time ago. They plan to have staff use the “guide” as the initial training and believe because there is little subjectivity in the instrument, they don’t need additional training. As a coach, it was recommended that they explore their expected outcomes from this process as well as consider a “Webinar” as training for all identified staff. The backgrounds and skills of the different staff at different facilities may not reach their expectations without some formal training. Their instrument could become a model for other states as a guide for which they would need to validate the outcomes for their own populations.
The data base is in the design phase and they are building the model after their “Offender Complaint System.” A major issue is data storage. Examples include enough storage for investigative files, interviews, videos, and tape recordings. These are complex and costly issue.
The coach indicated that travel to Washington D.C. for meetings will not occur, therefore, they can request a GAN to re-purpose the monies. The coach sent an email indicating the basic requirements when submitting a GAN.
Their challenges include the determination of the vacant psychologist position and re-designing it to meet their current needs. They will submit a GAN for a shift in the positon as well as the travel monies. They will be requesting an extension for the investigative data base and analysis of the screening instrument. Getting staff at critical levels to approve the instrument was a challenge over four years. The instrument is in a paper format but the data input is electronic.
The coach will send copies of other state Instruments to Ms. Preston in the future for comparative purposes. Ms. Preston felt that the Web Meeting was ahead of where they are as it focused on managing the data and outcomes. She felt the information will be useful in the future.
Our next meeting will be in early June, 2016.
Wisconsin Department of Corrections
August, 30, 2016
Quarterly Coaching Update
Attendees: Christine Preston, State PREA Director, Leigha Weber, PREA Program and Policy Analyst, Jason Ruff, Data Analyst and Peg Ritchie, PRC Coach
On August 17, 2016, the PREA Coach, Peg Ritchie, conducted a quarterly conference call with the Wisconsin Department of Corrections staff to discuss updates on the Goals and Objectives for their grant. The main focus of the grant is to develop a comprehensive approach to PREA implementation including the development of a PREA database which will include their Risk Assessment Instrument. They have designed and are piloting a gender responsive risk assessments for males and females and plan to validate the instruments.
UPDATES:
Primary efforts continue to be related to the IT data integration and analysis. The other objective that has not been met is related to the development of curriculum for annual in-service training for PREA Compliance Managers and Victim Service staff.
Risk Assessment Implementation and IT Integration
Currently they have over 40,000 risk assessment instrument in a paper format. These documents are housed at the office of the PREA Coordinator. Due to delays in getting the Risk Assessment digital and integrated into their IT system. The Data Analyst indicated that they are winding down the business requirements for the data system design and will soon begin programming. The Risk Assessment will be integrated into the overall Investigation Assessment Module. Allegations outcomes are part of the system (triggers for re-assessment, high risk housing, PREA data collection, etc. Christy indicated that the new administration is making PREA a priority. The administration hosted a four-day session with all divisions making PREA a priority, the IT system in particular. Deadlines for the IT integration include: 2017 Feb/March completion for final testing, roll out to facilities and divisions next and then staff training. They plan on going “live” May of 2017. The paper copy of the initial Intake Risk Assessments are still in Christy ‘s office (2 official copies; one with Inmate Social Service file and the other PREA Office.) They have made a decision that the formal original Risk Assessment will now go into the Inmate Social service file. The Social Service file data is integrated into the WIC system IT and therefore will create a way in which results of the Risk Assessment will automatically populate the module that assigns housing.
They have asked the Coach to request information from other PREA Coordinators nationally (list serve the PRC has) on how they are protecting the confidentiality of “paper” risk assessments. The coach will follow up with a PREA consultant. Open record laws are possible in Wisconsin according to their legal team and the risk assessment could be discoverable under the Freedom of Information Act.
Budget
They will submit a GAN for the change in position title and description (from a psychologist position to a data analyst position). Their request for an annual extension for the grant will be signed by the Secretary of the DOC this week.
Other
Christy indicated that they sent their Grant documentation updates to in June and received letter recently from BJA complimenting them on their progress.
Their main focus in the next few months will continue to be IT integration and once their GAN is approved they will proceed with training for victim service staff and PREA Compliance Managers (annual updates).
The coach provided basic PRC updates.
Our next meeting will be in early November, 2016
they are requesting a grant extension until 9/30/ 2017
Please respond to the Performance Metrics below. The Performance Metrics questions are based on the TTA Type indicated in the General Information section of the TTA.
Please submit a signed letter of support from your agency’s executive or other senior staff member. The letter can be emailed to or uploaded with this request. The letter should be submitted on official letterhead and include the following information:
- General information regarding the request for TTA services, i.e., the who, what, where, when, and why.
- The organizational and/or community needs specific to the request for TTA services.
- The benefits or anticipated outcomes from the receipt of TTA services.
By submitting this application to BJA NTTAC, I understand that upon approval of this application for TTA, the requestor agrees to keep BJA NTTAC informed of any circumstances that may impact the delivery of the TTA, including changes in the date of the event, event cancellation, or difficulties communicating with the assigned TTA provider.
Please call [site:phone] if you need further assistance completing this application.