Program Profile: Restoring Promise (South Carolina)

This is a prison housing unit program for young adults that seeks to change correctional culture and increase safety. The program is rated Promising. Young adults in the treatment group had a statistically significant lower likelihood of violent charges and convictions, compared with the control group. There were no statistically significant differences between treatment and control groups on the number of disciplinary charges or convictions, or serious incidents or events in the facilities.

A Promising rating implies that implementing the program may result in the intended outcome(s).

This program's rating is based on evidence that includes at least one high-quality randomized controlled trial.

Program Goals

Restoring Promise is a program that partners with corrections agencies to create young adult housing units in adult facilities. The program is rooted in four key pillars based on juvenile justice research and practice about what works to reduce violence, including 1) safety, 2) family engagement, 3) fairness, and 4) purpose (Shanahan 2023). These prison housing units are grounded in human dignity and target young adults ages 18–25. They operate with re-trained staff and trained mentors; use developmentally appropriate activities, workshops, and opportunities for young adults; and foster healing, self-determination, and restored relationships with family and the community (Vera Institute of Justice N.d.). The goal of the program is to disrupt harmful prison practices and increase safety for corrections staff and incarcerated young adults.

Program Components/Key Personnel

All Restoring Promise housing units are placed in adult medium- and maximum-security facilities, and they all differ based on the agency’s staffing capacity, resources, and the physical space available.

In South Carolina, there are three broad areas related to the implementation of Restoring Promise: 1) young adults are supported by trained staff and mentors and their families, 2) young adults learn about and practice restorative justice, and 3) young adults participate in a daily routine that is structured and organized. The Restoring Promise housing units are led by trained correctional professionals and mentors, who are incarcerated adults over the age of 25 serving long or life sentences and who live on the unit with the young adults. Daily, corrections professionals and mentors work in partnership to provide young adults with guidance, structure, and support. The team guides the young adults as they navigate the prison environment, maintains structure and accountability on the unit, and meaningfully prepares the young adults to successfully transition back into their communities. Specifically, mentors bridge the gap between incarcerated young adults and corrections professionals. Mentors co-create the community agreements (unit rules) with the unit’s corrections professionals; hold young adults accountable when community agreements are violated; schedule activities, workshops, and trainings on topics such as personal finances, art and culture, conflict resolution, life choices, and parenting; and facilitate team-building activities/programs on the units. Each mentor is also assigned to a group of young adults to provide one-on-one support. Mentors create a trusted space with their assigned group, teaching young adults how to communicate effectively to work through conflicts, to identify and talk about their emotions, and prepare for successful transition out of prison.

Family engagement, broadly defined as using supportive people in a young adult’s life, is a critical part of the program. Correctional staff and mentors work with young adults’ support systems to help them navigate their time in the Restoring Promise community. Families and loved ones of the young adults are invited to attend an orientation to introduce them to the initiative and allow them to experience the unit. Family members are encouraged to help make their loved one’s cell a space of comfort and familiarity, which may include bringing comforters and decorating with photographs and other sentimental items. Family engagement events are also held to strengthen young adults’ connections to their families. The family engagement events are less restrictive spaces that allow for more intimate interactions, where young adults share their accomplishments and certificates with their families and introduce their families to their mentors and corrections staff.

Restorative justice practices replace punishment on the Restoring Promise units, to hold young adults accountable as needed. In addition to the state’s Department of Corrections rules, unit staff and mentors create community agreements (for example, participation in twice daily check-ins) that dictate expectations and the restorative practices that would be used in response to any violations of community agreements. Restorative circles are held for more serious violations of the community agreements, to provide space for the incarcerated person to openly acknowledge the harm their behavior caused the community and provide opportunity for the community to have an input on how the harm can be restored.

The units shape daily routines that are reflective of life in the community. Young adults spend 15 hours a day out of their cells, attend school or participate in a vocational education program, and work within the facility. On the unit, the young adults complete chores, participate in a wide range of enrichment programming (e.g., Critical Thinking, Healing 101, Interviewing 101, Cultural Awareness), and meet with their mentors one on one. Community spaces, designed by the incarcerated individuals on the unit, include refurbished cells and rooms for meditation and religious practice, self-expression/conflict resolution, computers, a library, barbering, and laundry. There are group check-ins in the mornings and evenings, often held in the form of circles led by the team of corrections professionals and mentors. The twice daily check-ins reinforce a sense of community on the unit, engage everyone’s voice, and bring in everyone’s unique perspectives and experiences to handle unit matters collaboratively.

Study 1

Shanahan (2023) conducted a randomized controlled trial to examine the effect of Restoring Promise on violent and disciplinary charges and convictions and serious incidents among young adults in two South Carolina prisons, after one year of participation. The two prisons were Lee Correctional Institution (Lee), a maximum-security facility that houses young men serving long sentences, typically for violent crimes; and Turbeville Correctional Institution (Turbeville), a medium-security prison that houses young men sentenced under South Carolina?s Youthful Offender Act, which targets young people ages 18 to 25 who are convicted of a first-time, nonviolent offense.

Young adults in these two facilities were alerted to the opportunity to apply to live in a Restoring Promise unit via flyers posted in common areas. The flyers outlined how their experience on the unit would differ from general population housing, the purpose of the initiative, and how to apply. Applicants were eligible if they were between the ages of 18 and 25, had at least two months left on their sentence at the time of randomization, and if they had no state-mandated programming requirements connected to housing status (for example, a requirement to live in an alcohol treatment unit). Applications were accepted on a rolling basis. Randomization occurred in waves, based on the availability of beds in the Restoring Promise units. As vacancies emerged on the units, bedspace was held until there were at least 10 beds available, at which point a new wave of participants were randomly assigned to the housing unit. Two hundred applicants were randomly assigned to either the Restoring Promise treatment group (n = 100) or a control group that remained in the general population (n = 100) in 10 groups over the course of 14 months (between January 2019 and March 2020). Stratified randomization was used to ensure balance between the treatment arms on the strongest predictors of the outcomes. Disciplinary history was used for both prisons, and applicants to Turbeville were stratified additionally by race.

One year pretreatment, participants in the treatment group were on average 20.7 years old, 81 percent Black, and 54 percent were housed in medium custody. Their most serious offense categories were determined by the most serious crimes that the participants were convicted of when sentenced to incarceration, based on the South Carolina Department of Corrections categories 1 through 5. Treatment group participants were mostly convicted of level three offenses (33 percent) or level four offenses (45 percent). During the pretreatment year, 56 percent of the treatment group had a disciplinary charge in the facility, 53 percent had a disciplinary conviction in the facility, 21 percent had a violent charge in the facility, 18 percent had a violent conviction in the facility, and 21 percent had a serious incident or event in the facility. One year pretreatment, participants in the control group were on average 21.4 years old, 80 percent Black, and 52 percent were housed in medium custody. The most serious offenses that the control group participants were convicted of, when sentenced to incarceration, were level three offenses (48 percent) or level four offenses (29 percent). During the pretreatment year, 52 percent of the control group had a disciplinary charge in the facility, 51 percent had a disciplinary conviction in the facility, 23 percent had a violent charge in the facility, 21 percent had a violent conviction in the facility, and 21 percent had a serious incident or event in the facility. The treatment and control groups were balanced across all variables except age, and the percentage of participants with a most serious offense level 3 and most serious offense level 4. Most serious offense was not a statistically significant predictor of the outcomes of interest, but age was controlled for in the analysis.

The cumulative observation period was from December 2019 to April 2021. Outcomes that occurred in the prisons within one year of the participant?s start date were analyzed using administrative data provided by the South Carolina Department of Corrections, which has five levels of severity for offenses that occur within their prisons. Filtered disciplinary outcomes were derived from a filtered version of charge and conviction data; these were used to account for measurement bias as a result of overreporting of incidences on Restoring Promise units that were not formal violations in the general prison population (for example, ?not participating in morning circles?). Disciplinary outcomes also included violent charges and violent convictions or other informal resolutions. Violence was defined using official South Carolina Department of Corrections definitions of violent/assaultive behavior. The management information notes outcome included data derived from a tracking system of serious incidences or events that occurred in each facility, including injuries, suicide or self-harm, use of force, and medical or mental health interventions.

An intent-to-treat design was used. Outcomes were tracked for all treatment and control participants even if they did not ultimately receive the intervention or received a partial dose (for example, young adults who were suspended or expelled from the unit). To assess treatment effect, logistic regression models were estimated. Effect sizes were calculated as odds ratios, and models included the participant?s age, race, education level, custody level, time at risk/exposure, and a proportion of time spent in COVID-19 lockdown, as well as a pretreatment measure of the outcome. No subgroup analysis was conducted.

Restoring Promise staff and mentors were trained using a three-week curriculum that covered young adult development, family engagement, conflict resolution, restorative justice, and communication skills. Restoring Promise also facilitated workshops with the corrections professionals and mentors prior to the opening of the housing unit, to plan the structure of the new unit and design how it would operate (Shanahan 2023).

These sources were used in the development of the program profile:

Following are CrimeSolutions-rated programs that are related to this practice:

Treatment in Secure Corrections for Serious Juveniles Who Have Committed Serious or Multiple Offenses

This practice includes interventions targeting serious (violent and chronic) juveniles sentenced to serve time in secure corrections. The overall goal is to decrease recidivism rates when juveniles are released and return to the community. The practice is rated Effective for reducing general recidivism and serious recidivism of violent and chronically offending juveniles.

Evidence Ratings for Outcomes

	Crime & Delinquency - Serious recidivism
	Crime & Delinquency - Multiple crime/offense types

Why might a practice's outcome ratings differ from the ratings of specific programs encompassed by that practice?