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HEIF: Prison Officers and Creativity; Supporting the Self and the Inmate

People Involved

Profile image of Dr Jo Metcalf

Dr Jo Metcalf J.Metcalf@hull.ac.uk
Senior Lecturer in American Studies & Criminology

Project Description

This project aims to be the first in the UK to pilot creative writing workshops for prison officers, respecting the UoH’s commitment to social justice. It will support employees in a role that government and academic research recognizes is “vital”, but that comes with real-world vulnerabilities in terms of mental wellbeing, exposure to violence, and, hence, a high turnover of staff. The project will offer bespoke courses in creative writing that will have impact for officers in the workplace (supporting their mental health) as well improving officer-prisoner relationships. The workshop structures stem from tried-and-tested prisoner study / writing groups that underpinned PI Metcalf’s world-leading / internationally excellent impact case study (50% 4* / 50% 3*) for the English UoA REF 2021.
The first set of workshops will run at HMP Hull, where the PI has a strong track record of collaboration and delivery on a range of research-informed, impact and KE initiatives. The KE will generate educational resources and will likely lead to CPD in terms of rolling these workshops out to prison staff at other institutions across England & Wales. The data on prison officer participants will be gathered by the Centre for Human Factors (CHF) that has interests in measuring wellbeing in the workplace, and supported by Co-I Nichols who recently completed a project exploring the mental health of prison governors. The participants’ writings will also be textually analysed by Metcalf and Co-I Westoby for evidence of creative impact on wellbeing. Findings will be reported in a policy brief for the Ministry of Justice (MoJ), among other outputs.

Status Project Complete
Value £43,112.00
Project Dates Aug 1, 2022 - Jul 31, 2023

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