Criminal Justice Day at Griffin

Crime and its punishments continue to evolve in the U.S., and the UGA-Griffin campus will hold an informative conference this Friday, "After Mass Incarceration: Charting a Path to the Future," that will offer a look at promising trends in society as well for professionals in the field:

[The conference] will provide an opportunity for professionals from varied areas of criminal justice—law enforcement, law and the courts, corrections and the faith community—to convene and discuss these reforms and their impact on communities and to suggest alternatives to incarceration. Registration is free, but seating is limited.

"State budgets are straining, and recidivism rates have been virtually unaffected after decades of prison population growth, as the national conversation about crime and punishment has shifted," said Elizabeth Watts Warren, a lecturer in the UGA Franklin College of Arts and Sciences department of sociology on the UGA Griffin campus. "Georgia has been at the forefront of that conversation, enacting sweeping criminal justice reforms in 2012 that appear to be paying off as Georgia's prison population has declined each year since the reforms were implemented."

Additional presentations will explore new directions in prosecutions—especially drug offenses, evidence-based strategies to reduce recidivism, innovative practices for strengthening inmates' parental ties, the toll of human trafficking on communities, forensics and the need for broadly trained criminal justice professionals.

The interdisciplinary studies bachelor's degree with concentrations in sociology or psychology offered by the Franklin at the UGA-Griffin campus prepares graduates for a range of careers, including many fields within criminal justice. The conference is free but registration is required. For more details, visit http://www.ugacjday.com.

Image: Sketch of Richard Mentor Johnson freeing a man from debtors' prison, via wikimedia commons.