Following the recent economic downturn, the religious roots of American corrections have begun to re-popularize. While faith-based correctional interventions are common, there is very little known about their effectiveness with offender populations. Drawn from 15 studies, 57 effect sizes were calculated to estimate the average impact of religious prison programming on inmate attitudes and disciplinary infractions. Producing a weighted mean effect size of-.23 (g =-.45 for attitudinal adjustments; g =-.15 for institutional misconduct), the results indicate that religious interventions produce a modest but significant alteration to offender values and behaviors.
Quality correctional programming is important, particularly for drug courts. In this article, we chronicle the development of a tool designed to evaluate juvenile and adult drug courts, the Evidence-Based Correctional Program Checklist-Drug Court (CPC-DC). The history of the CPC-DC is traced by exploring research that indicates why program evaluation is important. This article also discusses the development of two predecessor assessment tools designed to measure how closely correctional programs adhere to evidence-based practice, the Correctional Program Assessment Inventory (CPAI) and the Evidence-Based Correctional Program Checklist (CPC). Results are briefly presented on the outcomes of the CPC-DC assessments completed to date by the University of Cincinnati (UC). Finally, recommendations are offered for operating an evidence-based drug court.
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