Smart Reentry and Supervision (FY 2022)

The Smart Reentry and Supervision: Grants, Tools, and Technical Assistance to Facilitate Change (Smart Reentry and Supervision) Program seeks to improve the capacity and effectiveness of corrections agencies to increase the success of adults returning to their communities from incarceration. It also seeks to improve the capacity and effectiveness of probation and parole agencies to facilitate successful outcomes for people on supervision. In both cases, promoting success requires addressing underlying risk and needs among the target population (adults in reentry or on supervision). At the same time, both institutional and community corrections agencies are balancing a shrinking workforce with a complicated mission to facilitate successful outcomes for their target populations.

Under Categories 1 and 2 of this solicitation, the Bureau of Justice Assistance (BJA) will fund institutional and community corrections agencies to improve reentry and supervision outcomes. Selected agencies will also receive training and technical assistance (TTA), to include assistance in the development and implementation of real-time technology tools designed to work with their existing data and case management systems.

Goals, Objectives, and Deliverables

Goals

Generally, this program’s goals are to plan and implement or expand practices and service delivery systems that address the needs of adults in reentry or on supervision to promote reentry and supervision success. The specific goals of this program are to improve institutional corrections and community corrections agencies’ capacity to (1) provide services and support to adults under their correctional control based on their individually assessed needs and facilitate successful community reintegration and/or supervision through accountability and positive change, (2) track the outcomes of current policies and practices and inform future decisions, and (3) adopt and use technology to assist these outcomes.

Objectives

  1. Assess agencies’ capacity to meet their missions and their populations’ needs, including to reduce recidivism among the target population
  2. Develop action plans to increase capacity using promising and evidence-based practices, as well as technology tools
  3. Implement plans to help strengthen outcomes for adults in reentry and on supervision
  4. Develop and adopt technology solutions and tools to facilitate or support implementation of those plans
  5. Test improvement strategies or bring enhancements to scale, including incorporating new technology tools into operations
  6. Pursue continuous quality improvement to measure outcomes and promote accountability
  7. Promote and increase collaboration among agencies and officials
  8. Conduct a process and outcome evaluation of objectives 1–7

Deliverables

  1. Develop an action plan*
  2. Facilitate information sharing, including data-sharing agreements, as needed with TTA
  3. Implement policy and practice improvements*
  4. Adopt the selected technology tool(s)
  5. Category 1: Establish a pilot program or expand an existing one
    Category 2: Establish a pilot program or expand an existing program to test an improvement(s) according to the above or train staff to bring enhancements to scale
  6. Participate in a process and outcome evaluation*

*Category 1 only

For more information, see the most recent BJA grant solicitation and materials.