The
Department of Corrections
The
New Zealand Department of Corrections was established in 1995 from the
Department of Justice. It comprises of a variety of business units
including the Public Prisons Service (PPS) and Offender Service (OS) which
incorporates the Psychological
Service (PS), Intervention
Service
(IS) and Community Probation
Service (CPS.
The
explicit goal of the Department is reducing re-offending and since its
creation, the Department has set about an ambitious program of
refining its structure and operation in line with internationally
established and empirically derived principles of best practice. A pivotal
feature in the Department’s emphasis on improving the quality of its
services has been the Integrated
Offender Management Project. This project, now completed, has
resulted in significant enhancements in the way in which the Department
assesses, treats, and facilitates the re-integration of offenders back
into the community.
The
Department of Corrections maintains a well established Psychological
Service (PS), which within the organisational structure sits within Offender
Services (OS). The Psychological Service Director is a
psychologist and is located within the Department of Corrections
Wellington National Office. There are two Regional Managers (North &
South) and the service in the field is located in 12
sites, each of which is managed by a Principal Psychologist.
Nine of the Psychological Service offices are responsible
for the provision of clinical services to offenders both in prisons and
serving community-based sentences (via the Probation Service). These
offices are also responsible for the provision of assessment reports and
expert testimony to the National Parole Board and to the Department of
Courts, to assist with sentencing. The provision of consultation,
training and supervision of Correctional staff is also a key role. These
nine offices are typically sited within the commercial centres of the
towns and cities where they are located.
The
Psychological Service is also responsible for operation of three specialist prison based treatment units. Two of
these were established specifically for the purpose of treating men who
sexually offend against children and the third is for the treatment of
high-risk violent offenders. These units are well resourced, have a high
staff to client ratio, deliver intensive group-based therapy programmes
and also serve as research facilities. Staff pursue lines of scientific
enquiry which contributes to the body of knowledge regarding these types
of offenders and also serves to further enhance treatment and assessment
practices.
The Psychological
Service has had a significant input into every aspect of the Integrated
Offender Management (IOM) project, designed to co-ordinate services to
offenders throughout the departments divisions (i.e., Community Probation
and Public Prisons). Psychological Service has ensured that the way in
which the Department carries out its business in the future will be
consistent with modern psychological approaches to offender
rehabilitation.
In addition to the
provision of assessment and treatment services to offenders, the
Psychological Service is also active in the areas of policy development.
They also provide for supervision of field staff within the probation and
prisons services and have made significant contributions to the emphasis
on developing bi-cultural practices within the Department.
The Psychological
Service has a strong research role, reflecting the scientist-practitioner
model of clinical practice. In recent years, the service has conducted
significant treatment evaluations of its work which have demonstrated its
effectiveness in reducing re-offending. Additionally, the results of the service’s
research into the areas of risk assessment and the assessment of offending
behaviour (i.e., criminogenic needs) has strongly influenced procedures on a Department wide
basis.
The full implementation of the
Integrated Offender
Management project has seen the Psychological Service playing an
increased role in the areas of program development, staff training and
supervision, quality assurance, and evaluation of both the implementation
and efficacy of the new practices.
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The Psychological Service
Employment
Opportunities
The
Psychological Service has offices in Kaikohe, Auckland, Hamilton, Rotorua,
Hastings, Palmerston North, Wellington, Christchurch and Dunedin. They
also have three prison based special treatment units located in
Christchurch,
Wellington and Auckland. They employ a range of professionals into the following
roles.
Psychologists
Psychologists
(1) : located
at
a Psychological Service office, psychologists travel to both prison
and community probation offices to provide individual assessment and
treatment for offenders; specialist offence focused risk
assessment reports to parole boards and courts; and consultation and training to Correction staff.
Psychologists
(2) : located
at special prison based treatment units, this role
focuses on group treatment of child sex offenders or high risk violent
offenders. Assessment, report writing and providing consultation is also an
important element of these roles.
Senior
Psychologists: complete all the
tasks described in the previous two types of positions with the addition of providing clinical
supervision, referral management, complex assessments and expert
testimony.
Principal
Psychologists: are
responsible for [i] leading, developing and supervising a team of
psychologists; [ii] providing high quality psychological services including
assessment, treatment, research, training; [iii] managing
relations with other services, agencies and groups; [iv] the allocation
and effective utilisation of resources.
Non
Psychologist Roles
Rehabilitation
Workers: assist
leading therapy groups, assist in data gathering, work with families and
community groups, monitor the reconditioning process and oversee the
release and follow up programme.
The
Psychological Service also employs research officers and cultural consultants.
See
our jobs page for current vacancies. If the
position of interest is not available you can still complete an
application to lodge ready for the position becoming available.
The Advantages of Working for
the Psychological Service
The Psychological
Service offers attractive remuneration packages, well resourced employment conditions, superior IT
facilities, significant professional development provision,
excellent career development opportunities and in some cases a
contribution towards
relocation expenses.
What
to expect:
The
work of Psychological Service psychologists is highly valued throughout the
Department, the National Parole Board and the Courts.
The
service itself has a reputation for the high calibre of its staff who are
encouraged to develop professionally by the provision of quality
clinical supervision, attendance at training courses and conferences and
support to attain advanced educational qualifications.
Progression
within the service is by a competency based remuneration system, which
recognizes abilities.
In
addition to the competitive remuneration, psychologists can earn up to 7.5%
bonus above base salary (20% for psychologists in a management position).
Departmental
psychologists are part of an energetic, well-managed and progressive
Government Department.
All
offices have strong links with their local university, where staff are
often called on to provide visiting lectures. Training opportunities
are made available to trainee psychologists from both New Zealand and also
some Australian universities.
Departmental
psychologists often have the opportunity to develop and pursue relevant programmes
of research.
Psychologists
can expect to gain valuable experience in the provision of culturally
appropriate services through the services culturally based initiatives.
Psychologists
and other professionals working in Forensic settings in the UK,
and Correctional settings in Canada and Australia will in particular find similarities between their current roles and the roles offered in New
Zealand.
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The
New Zealand Department of Corrections established Intervention Services on
1 July 2003
to manage the delivery of intervention programmes to offenders and
contribute to the Department’s goal of reducing reoffending.
Structure
The
design for Intervention Services has been based on a regional structure of
specialist teams focused on delivering programmes, supported by a national
team providing training, scheduling, monitoring and evaluation. The
regional and national teams work closely together.
Programme Delivery
Intervention
Services is responsible for the delivery of:
Straight
Thinking a 70 hour,
group-based programme delivered in two hour sessions to closed groups of
offenders in both community and prison settings. The programme is
instructive and focuses on modifying impulsive, self-centred and rigid
thinking.
Criminogenic
programmes are a suite
of 100 hour programmes delivered in 2.5 hour sessions to closed groups of
offenders in both community and prison settings. The programmes aim to
reduce the level and / or seriousness of reoffending by assisting
participants to identify and change the attitudes and beliefs that maintain
their offending behaviour.
Criminogenic
Needs Inventory (CNI ) Training
–
Intervention Services is responsible for the
training of Probation Officers and Sentence Planners (Correctional Officers) in the use of the Criminogenic Needs Inventory (CNI), an assessment
tool for determining an offenders criminogenic needs. Criminogenic
needs are factors (thoughts, emotions and behaviour) associated with
offending and reoffending.
Facilitator
Training for the delivery of Straight Thinking and criminogenic
programmes.
Employment
Range
of opportunities:
Programme
Facilitators: assess offenders for programme
suitability, prepare and deliver programme sessions, liase with case
officers and probation officers regarding offender progress, draft reports
as required, run maintenance groups and attend supervision and
training.
Supervising
Facilitators:
support the Manager Programme Delivery by embedding practice standards,
providing expert advice and direct management support of other facilitators,
on-site problem solving, and technical advice on operational matters to team
members. The Supervising Facilitator will be expert in and undertake
programme delivery. These positions contribute to developing and
implementing quality systems, policies and practices, identifying trends and
training development needs and model Departmental values.
Team
Leaders Programme Delivery: manage
the performance and development of the team, contribute to the
development of Intervention Service strategy and to deliver programme
interventions to offenders in prisons and in the community. The
role contributes to achieving the Department’s goals in rehabilitation of
offenders through the development of quality programme delivery and the
strategic development of Intervention Services
Trainers:
effectively deliver high quality training to staff who undertake offender
assessment and who deliver rehabilitative intervention programmes to
offenders. The Intervention Services (IS) trainer will deliver training,
participate in the development of course content and materials, and promote
and model high standards of skill development and process integrity for
course participants.
Want to Know More?
See
our jobs page for current vacancies.
If the
position you want is not available you can still complete an
application and lodge for when the position becomes available. Contact us
for an
information and application packs.
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