For

Former welfare clients in prison

Hilde Hetland*, Anette Christine Iversen*, Ole Johan Eikeland**, Terje Manger*

*University of Bergen, **Eikeland Research and Teaching

Aim

• The aim of this presentation is to address educational issues and self-efficacy among former child welfare clients in Norwegian prisons

Background

• Recently, there has been an increased attention on poor long-term outcomes for former child welfare clients both in Norway and internationally

• Many child welfare clients lack education, despite existing documentation on how positive educational experiences may contribute to resilience and recovery in contexts of adversity

Background

• Moreover, it is a sad fact that many former child welfare clients end up in prison

Background

• Research addressing educational background and other factors (such as self-efficacy) related to individuals who have been in the welfare system as children is a neglected area

• Studies of incarcerated former welfare clients are close to nonexistent

Background- prison education

• Attaining an education in prison can also be a way of starting a new path in life for the prisoner (Manger, Eikeland, Diseth, Hetland, & Asbjørnsen, 2010)

• Norway has put strong effort into prison education, as there is an increasing awareness of the importance of educating prisoners to improve their life-quality and reduce recidivism (Steurer & Smith, 2003)

Background- prison education

• Students in a prison context are equivalent to all Norwegian citizens entitled to adapted and customized education based on their own abilities and needs

• Given common interpretation of education law in Norway, prisoners are entitled to access to education in the same manner as other citizens and residents

Background- prison education

• In Norway the educational authorities in civilian society have the professional and financial responsibility for education and training in the correctional services

• Prison education and training is thus equivalent to education outside prison with, for example, the same formal teacher qualifications

Background- prison education

• The context for prison education in Norway is based on the “import model” or “administrative cooperation model”, where the prisons are formally linked to the ordinary public services available outside the prison

The import model is meant to lead to circumstances that are as normal and open as possible within a closed system

• More specifically the research questions were:

– what is the educational background of this group? – to what extent do they have learning difficulties? – do they want to participate in prison education? – to what extent do they participate ?– How is their self-efficacy compared to other

prisoners?

Jan. July Aug. Jan. Feb Apr.Feb. March April May June May

2006 2009

Study procedure

A representative telephoned each Prison Governor and each teacher in charge of the prison education, in order to outline the purpose of the study and to arrange for the assessment to be carried out.

Study procedure:

• In addition, a letter was sent to the same persons explaining the procedures. In line with instructions from the research group, the Prison Governor in each prison or the teacher in charge of the prison education carried out the survey

Method

• Subjects• The participants were part of a target group that included

all 3 359 prisoners over 18 years of age in Norwegian prisons

• Of those who received the survey, 2 065 persons, or 63.7 percent, responded. For the present article 1 648 prisoners, 750 who attended prison education and 898 who did not attend, were included

• The mean age of all prisoners in the study was 35 years of age

Method:

• The front page of the questionnaire to all inmates explained the purpose and procedure of the study, and it was emphasized that participation in the study was voluntary

• Confidential and no specific feedback on their performance provided

• Inmates with reading and writing problems or who were not fluent in English or Norwegian were offered help during the completion of the questionnaire

• The survey registered at the Norwegian Data Inspectorate in accordance with Norwegian law and accepted by the Regional Ethic Committee

Results

Results

• Around 1/3 of the prisoners reported to be former child welfare clients.

Child welfare contact

Yes No

Age group

18-24 50.4% (182) 49.6% (179)

25-34 36.5% (245) 63.5% (426)

35-44 24.3% (123) 75.7% (384)

45 - 20.1 % (70) 79.9% (278)

Gender

Male 32.5% (581) 67.5% (1208)

Female 34.0% (50) 66.0% (97)

Citizenship

Norwegian 38.0% (509) 62.0% (832)

Foreign 20.5% (122) 79.5% (473)

Length of sentence

< 3 months 29.2% (106) 70.8% (257)

3-12 months 40.0% (169) 60.0% (253)

1-5 years 32.6% (170) 67.4% (351)

> 5 years 25.4% (61) 74.6% (179)

1

Self-reported difficulties in reading, writing and mathematics. 1

Child welfare contact

Yes No

Reading

to a high degree 11.0% 5.9%

to some degree 13.3% 14.2%

yes, a little 25.8% 18.6%

no 49.9% 61.4%

Writing

to a high degree 12.8% 6.0%

to some degree 23.5% 18.7%

yes, a little 24.7% 23.7%

no 39.0% 51.6%

Mathematics

to a high degree 24.8% 12.1%

to some degree 31.0% 26.9%

yes, a little 23.3% 26.9%

no 20.9% 34.1%

2

Child welfare contact and highest level of completed education 1

n Not

completed

Primary and lower

secondary

1-2 year upper sec/

high school

3 years upper sec/

high school

Single

university courses

Degree

university

In contact with child welfare ?

Yes 12.6% 31.3% 38.5% 11.3% 3.7% 2.6%

No 7.4% 19.7% 32.9% 22.7% 9.9% 7.4%

2

3

Child welfare contact and educational wish in prison 1

No education

Primary and secondary

High school

1/2/3

University or college

Other

In contact with child welfare

Yes 28.9% 3.9% 20.6%

7.1%

9.0%

8.9% 21.5%

No 28.3% 2.9% 9.5%

5.3%

6.8%

14.0% 33.2%

2

3

4

Child welfare contact and participation in prison education 1

Not participating

Primary and lower

secondary

High school

1/2/3

University or college

Other

In contact with child welfare

Yes 56.1% 3.3% 12.4%

4.4%

5.7%

2.1% 16.1%

No 53.4% 2.8% 9.0%

2.7%

4.4%

5.4% 21.4%

2

Self-efficacy

• Albert Bandura defines self-efficacy as:

“The individual’s perceived ability to succeed at or accomplish certain tasks”

Academic self-efficacy

• Students’ beliefs concerning their ability to perform academic related tasks (in math, reading etc)

Self efficacy

• Our findings reveal that former child welfare clients in prison differ from others in:

• Math self-efficacy• Grammar self-efficacy• Reading self-efficacy• School work self- efficacy

• But not in ICT self-efficacy

To sum up

• There is overall scarce systematic research on long term outcomes of children in the welfare system

• Our findings reveal that imprisoned former welfare clients struggle more than the average prisoner

• We found that many prisoners within the child former welfare group struggle with learning difficulties to a greater extent than other prisoners

• We found that the child welfare group has consistently lower self-efficacy than other prisoners

To sum up

• However…. • We also found that many former welfare clients wish to

start an education in prison- and that they also do

Discussion

• We found that child welfare prisoners have consistently lower self-efficacy than other prisoners

• Workshop assignment:• What can be possible implications of this?