Research Topic, Problem, Purpose and Questions Assignment 7: Brief Literature Review
Faculty Use Only
Dr. Roy Yarbrough, Mentor
Brief Literature Review
Writing a good literature review is an important aspect in the dissertation process. The writer needs to fully understand the purpose of the work and be knowledgeable of others who have already studied and reported similar research (Creswell, 2009). A well-written literature review allows the writer to get focused and stay on the right track in compiling relevant literature (Creswell, 2009). The literature review is an essential contribution and an integral part in the formal requirements in a dissertation. The writer is not only understands the material, they can draw from its conclusion, critique its conclusions and extract relevant material suitable in carrying out the writer’s own ideas and current research. The writer has done an annotated bibliography and an updated bibliography, and from the research selected, there were three peer-reviewed articles that were chosen to begin the literature review processes. There was a significant amount of articles of relevance to choose from, but the ones selected closely answered the following research questions derived earlier in this study. Also, following the research questions is a brief beginning literature review for the writer’s dissertation study:
Research Questions
Can education and training programs increase employment potential in ex-felons in Millington, TN?
Can those educational programs also decrease the rate of recidivism?
Does the age of the inmate factor in the recidivism rate up to a 5-year period?
Does the amount of educational remediation affect the recidivism rate?
Are the community service programs adequate enough to ensure that the ex-felons are not repeat offenders?
Literature Review The main focus of Esperian (2010) research was the economics of offering education to inmates and the overall cost of long-term warehousing of those inmates. The study attempted to carefully monitor educational prisons to estimate the benefit/cost analysis of its programs. The author even included data from the post-Civil War period where he mentioned the reformatory movement, which evolved in the late 19th century emphasizing education and training; and also on the basis of prisoner’s achievement and conduct after receiving an adequate of remediation. Esperian (2010) attempted in his study to answer three questions: Are the costs of incarceration and surveillance justified? Has crime been reduced? Are felons safer after remediation programs? These questions were to be answered by the author polling over 200 teaching faculty at the College of Southern Nevada who work part-time remediating felons in a penitentiary setting while reporting the information back to the staff of the Nevada Correctional Facility. Another concern of the author is to ensure that the inmates are not just being warehoused until their release date. Esperian (2010) even addressed the fact that this is a current concern of President Obama who used it in a speech in 2007 at Howard University. President Obama vowed that in his administration he would reduce the blind and counterproductive warehousing of nonviolent offenders. The study concluded that male offenders who participated in education programs while in prison reduced re-incarceration by 29%. According to Esperian (2010), advance educational program could save states more than $34 million over the next five years. He further notes that it costs states about $22,000 a year to incarcerate a prisoner. This is important to the writer’s study because it gives specific and current monetary contributions that the state of Tennessee would be saving per prisoner educated and the possible percentage in reduction of the recidivism rate in our state.
In the second
