The High-Performance Correctional Facility 
Lessons on Correctional Work, Leadership, and Effectiveness
By Gary F. Cornelius

A note from the author ...

"Training does not end at the Academy. The training a new recruit undergoes, no matter how rigorous, is only a beginning. Not until a corrections officer has experience with life on the cell block does the “real” job training begin—it’s on the front lines, where book knowledge meets reality, that deep learning takes place. Every shift is and should be a learning experience. Every challenge, whether met with success or failure, teaches something important—and whether an encounter ends well or badly, it becomes part of a learning process that never really ends until you retire. Working and learning form an ongoing, continuous feedback loop. That’s why it is so important that the lessons we take away from our successes and failures are the right lessons—because bad habits and wrong thinking can just as easily become ingrained in an officer as best practice and a positive attitude.

"There is a type of training that is informal, inexpensive, and intensely engaging, yet many jails and prisons don’t use it—“roll call” training. Roll call training is exactly what the name says it is—training that takes place at the beginning of a shift. By necessity, roll call training is brief. But because it can be improvised on short notice in response to a recent development or event, roll call training can serve as a quick, tactical response to a critical incident as well as a regular, ongoing opportunity to hone vital knowledge and skills through repetition and reinforcement. Regular off-site and in-service training is mandatory for almost all prisons and jails. Roll call training isn’t mandatory—but maybe it should be. Corrections managers should embrace it to ensure a competent and effective workforce. 

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