Abstract
This chapter explores the benefits of making as a tool for corrective rehabilitation, education and social wellbeing. Through a design-led research approach the team developed a new product system as part of a University Industry Collaboration (UIC) project with the manufacturing division of an adult correctional facility. The UIC research involved a formative study of four correction centres to determine capabilities with respect to the available technology and expertise. A new product system incorporating simple high-quality components was designed, enabling repeatable, industry compatible processes and universal access for a fluctuating labour force. Significantly, the research demonstrates that continued collaboration between university-based product design research units and manufacturing systems in correctional facilities should adopt a strategic approach to the development of products and practices. The research develops a series of principles for part and assembly design that we consider encourage positive educational and meaningful social well-being outcomes.
TopIntroduction
Corrective rehabilitation in the form of inmate work programs are in place around the world. There is substantial evidence to suggest that the provision of these programs lowers recidivism and provides better opportunities for inmates to be reintegrated into society at the end of their period of incarceration (UNODC, 2017). The authors echo the requirement and benefit of work programs within correctional contexts, and offer suggestions for the psychological factors that allow them to work effectively for individuals. Prison work programs require a suitable focus, and in order to maximise the benefits in this environment they can be based around the construction of objects.
In this paper the authors present a University Industry Collaboration (UIC) project for the development of a range of furniture products with both office workstations and loose break-out furniture to be constructed by inmates within a correctional context. UIC’s occur around the world between university research units and industry in order to provide research and development expertise and strategic foresight for future business activities. These partnerships can be completely or partially funded by government in the form of grant programs or alternatively the industry partner involved can directly fund the research with the corresponding university research unit.
For the aforementioned project the authors together with several collaborators connected with Corrective Services NSW through their existing relationship with (removed for peer review purposes). Being a division of the Department of Communities and Justice, Corrective Services manages approximately 13,000 inmates in 39 facilities in New South Wales and have a vested interest in successful inmate work programs. In this way the university research unit could be enlisted to perform research and development activity to update product lines and allow the continued expansion and success of their work programmes.
The commercial arm of Corrective Services NSW, Corrective Services Industries (CSI) operates over 100 commercial business units and service industries teams, strategically located in metro and regional correctional centres across NSW. Industry benefits from access to an increasing range of manufacturing and other service capabilities provided by inmates, and inmates benefit by gaining work skills that enhance employment opportunities on release and successful reintegration into the community (Corrective Services Industries, n.d.).
Later in this paper the authors detail how construction of higher quality objects can benefit the education of inmates and satisfy those in management of them. The design of these objects directly relates to the potential for the creation of sustainable enterprise where the end users of the products have an ongoing appreciation and appetite for these goods. As a mitigating factor of successful work programmes the authors argue that well designed ‘objects of activity’ leading to a sustainable enterprise might then be self-supporting and in turn lead to more successful work programs. Work programmes need to be sustainable therefore what is produced by the inmates must be what the market will accept even if initially sales (in this case) rely on supply to government entities through designated procurement procedures. Without products that are attractive and useful, the demand for those products will fall and a work program can become unsustainable.
TopBackground
In society, work as a widespread activity holds considerable value beyond remuneration. The social networks and meaning created through work activities both generates and directly supports an individual’s self-esteem. Then with technological change, illness, injury and subsequent job loss or in extreme cases incarceration, this access to work is lost, and for most people, confidence in one’s own worth can be drastically impaired.
Key Terms in this Chapter
Craft: A type of making that involves the hands, leading to a high level of skill in those tasks.
Lathe: An electric machine tool with the purpose of cutting a cylindrical object into a desired profile.
Computer Aided Design (CAD): Using specialised software on a computer to generate dimensionally accurate three-dimensional forms in order to produce drawings, illustrations and 3D Prints of those representations.
University Industry Collaboration (UIC): A UIC is a collaboration between a university research unit and an industry partner in order to provide research and development expertise and strategic foresight for future business activities.
Prototype: (in product design) the partial or complete building of an object to verify and test assumptions about that object so that it may become real.
On-The-Job-Training (OJT): A situation where people are trained in doing a type of work within the environment where they will use that knowledge and skills with the particular resources they require at hand.
Sketch Models: (in product design) a research method based on low-fidelity model making in which speed of making and immediate feedback are prioritised over a realistic appearance.
Edge-Banding Machine: A machine tool which applies an adhesive edge tape to the edge of flat material usually being particle board or plywood in order to improve its durability and appearance in use.
Sit-Stand Desks: Desks that provide different height levels in normal use so that throughout a period of work a worker can shift posture from sitting to standing providing a more suitable ergonomic outcome for the body.
Incarceration: A situation where an individual is confined to prison.
Table saw: An electric machine tool for cutting flat materials usually but not limited to timber.
Object of Activity: A term coined by Leontiev (1978) to describe the true motivation behind thought and action.
Design-Led Research: A type of research methodology that makes discoveries from direct intervention by the researcher through employing design practices as the primary means for inquiry.
Rehabilitation: A process to return a person to health or a law abiding state due to illness, injury or criminal activity.
Penological: Refers to the branch of social sciences that addresses the punishment of crime or prison management.
Activity Theory: A group of theories created by Lev Vygotsky, Alexei Leontiev and Sergei Rubinstein as a way to understand human behaviour as it relates to systems of work activities.
Academic Design: Academic Design refers to a form of research that unites areas of academic discourse with forms of industry practice to produce three types of outcome from the one project – new knowledge typically disseminated through academic literature, new innovative ‘ventures’ beyond what practice can typically predict and new (radical) designs that might be products, services or strategies (see Dorst, 2013 ).
Sleep Pods: Infrastructure that provides semi-private areas of enclosure which allow workers to refresh themselves through napping inside an office environment.
Innovation: A process where creative thoughts are put forth into tangible action, producing new outcomes or outcomes that advance prior creations.
Mill: An electric machine tool with a spinning cutter head with the purpose of cutting material layer-wise in successive passes from a given object.
Vocational Skills: Skills that pertain to future employment often in a line of technical work, taught in schools, trade-schools and higher education facilities, can be compared with OJT.
Lockdown: A situation where inmates would be confined to their cells usually put in place in response to unrest.
Hot Desking: A configuration in an office environment where desk positions are not allocated to an individual but are shared among staff based on a location preference for that day or subject to demand.
CNC Flatbed Routers: A computer numerically controlled machine with a spinning cutting head employed to cut shapes from flat materials.
Brake Press: A machine for folding metal in an industrial manufacturing context with high accuracy and repeatability.
Recidivism: The habitual relapse especially into criminal or antisocial behavior.
Group-Based Therapy: A form of psychotherapy conducted within a group situation inside prisons as a component of the rehabilitation process.
Super-Max: A prison that is set up for a super maximum level of security which is the most secure form of incarceration for high security inmates.
Production Unit: The section within a correctional centre where a particular type of manufacturing occurs e.g. upholstery, metal, timber etc.
Reflective Practice: A term coined by John Dewey referring to a state of reflection on one’s own actions which enables the formation of a process of continuous learning and improvement.
University Research Unit: Small teams of researchers within universities tasked with funded project work usually in conjunction with external partners.
Pan Brake: A manually operated machine with the purpose of folding sheet metal to a desired angle.
Breakout Space: An area within an office environment for informal activity such as relaxation with furniture to match.
Ideation: (in product design) a process to develop ideas and concepts usually centred around a collaborative drawing process.
Artefact: An object created by a human.
Phone Rooms: A designated ‘cupboard-like’ shared space found inside open-plan offices with the purpose of creating temporary privacy in order to make phone calls or conduct other activities.