An Evaluation of the Justice Research and Statistic Association’s Website

By

Statistics and policies are one of the many vital components of the creating and reporting of criminal trends in America. These statistics are devised from crimes that happen all around the United States.

Some of these crimes may have happened in neighborhoods around this area, while others may have not. As for reporting services on these statistics, the jrsa.org (Justice Research and Statistics Association) is a nonprofit organization focused on statewide surveys and research pertaining to the criminal justice system.
Don’t use plagiarized sources. Get your custom essay on
“ An Evaluation of the Justice Research and Statistic Association’s Website ”
Get custom paper
NEW! smart matching with writer
Based out of Washington D.C., the association’s website focuses on publishing occasional reports that help enforcement services obtain better knowledge of the crimes being committed around them.
The JRSA has been publishing reports as early as 1994, mainly consisting of Domestic Violence, Juvenile Justice, Sexual Assault, and Law Enforcement. The online site, however, consists of a plethora of valuable information that can aid in the research of any justice related topic. The JRSA’s website contains links to bureaus and justice departments from all around the United States. This includes, The Department of Justice, Federal Bureau of Investigation, and the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration.
Not only does the Justice Research and Statistics Association provide useful links to law enforcement and potential researchers, but it also publishes its own forum and digest that can be subscribed to. The forum is a newsletter published four times a year, whereas the digest is a summary of the JRSA’s studies on policymaking. The digest and forum contain a percentage of jargon littered throughout the statistics and reports.
However, this can be easily combatted due to the website having a massive list of terms and abbreviations built right in.
The JRSA’s website also states that the association works with state and federal agencies to provide adequate projects. These projects that the organization conducts help answer some of the questions that corrections students might ask. Furthermore, the JRSA’s website is a wonderful opportunity for employment for students majoring in Criminal Justice. The website offers research job opportunities from Alaska to Maryland with solid salaries and benefit packages. So, not only does the site provide useful information for law enforcement, but it also helps employ Criminal Justice graduates.
The JRSA also runs off of a staff of its own. The association consists of research managers, research associates, finance managers, and executive directors. Not only does the JRSA’s website work well, but it is also ran by PhD’s and individuals with master’s degrees. These individuals exist not only to provide accurate statistics and research, but to show other colleagues the use of these applications through web seminars (webinars). One section of the JRSA website is complete dedicated to hosting and playing webinars ranging from a wide variety of justice topics. A few of these include Utilizing State Criminal History Records for Justice Research Series and the Use of Administrative Records to Analyze Drug Abuse and Enforcement.
The webinars allow for an ease of use in terms of reading extensive reports created by the JRSA. Why would an individual need to read such a long report when that individual could listen to a webinar, simply by following along audibly or visually? Jrsa.org provides a great means of criminal justice research that can be accessed by all levels of the justice system. They help provide employment opportunities that relate to this research and offer salaries that would provide a comfortable, cushy job. The organization makes a full-hearted attempt at educating students and scholars on justice topics by providing lists of terms and links to federal websites.
The whole purpose of the Justice Research and Statistics Association’s website is to provide an easier means of understanding and evaluating the data recorded by crimes and justice oriented programs. The site itself is mainly fact based after the observation of an outside source. An individual can simply be able to tell that the organization is legitimate and funded by the federal government. Information seems to remain a top priority for the association in the highly detailed reports provided by the website.
The Justice Research and Statistics Association revolves around providing facts to its readers and it is easy to see the motivation that goes into the webinars and reports. Some of the reports are pages long and the webinars can be hours long, so this time consuming process would not be done simply to provide false information. At the bottom of the main page for the JRSA, it is said to be funded by a grant through the Bureau of Justice Statistics. So this leads to the conclusion that an assumption created to legitimize the website can be correct.
The Justice Research and Statistics Association is comprised of many different justice majors, PhDs, and scholars. Any given report can be evaluated by a student for its professional quality, based off of in-depth assessment. The statistics are taken from a wide variety of departments and bureaus scattered across the United States. The facts of these reports are typically pulled from the numbers given to the JRSA by different bureaus and departments. The author’s credentials are obviously posted on the cover or within the text of the forum, digest, or report. Many PhDs post their title on the cover of their works to tell the reader that the knowledge within the pages of the book is truthful. Jrsa.org appears to be occasionally updated by the administrators of the website. The bottom of the homepage indicates that the website has been continuously updated from 1998 2015
. To further prove that the site is updated frequently, an individual can sort through the reports by navigating to the report tab and the research tab. By sifting through the listings the reports go back as far as 1994. Some may be older than that, but the reports are continuous throughout the years that they have been created. There are quite a few recent entries from 2013 to now.
The JRSA is also expecting to be releasing a Justice Research and Policy Journal that covers criminal policies. The journal is written by Dr. David Olson and is expected to be release in the Fall of 2015. The website, overall, is well rounded in the information that it distributes to the public in terms of creditability and release date.
The Justice and Research Statistics Association is not as developed in the amount of information that is on the website. Compared to sites like the Bureau of Justice Statistics (bjs.gov), the information would seem sparse. In terms of opinions, the Justice and Research Statistics Association provides one straight forward report, usually followed up by an explanation. The explanation could be seen as an opinion in only a small percent of these reports, because upon observation the reports do not really need much explaining. The structure of the reports is relatively nice, containing close to no spelling errors and grammar mistakes within the format of the digests or journals. The journals structuring is not the only thing that is enjoyable about reading the statistics, but it goes into an amazing amount of depth, especially in the webinars. Overall, the site does contain only a certain amount of information, but it describes the statistics and research in an enjoyable format.
To conclude, the website contains a multitude of useful information for a student or scholar of the justice system. While not containing a lot of information, the site can be easily used by a student in the CJA 101 course. The ease of use on the website is incredible and all of the information comes from a reliable source. Frequently updated reports allow for current statistics and research to be used by just about anyone. The Justice Research and Statistics Association is an informative, non-profit organization focused on creating concise reports for the criminal justice community.
Citations

(MLA) “Justice Research and Statistics Association.” Justice Research and Statistics Association. BjS.gov, 1998. Web. 08 Sept. 2015.
“Bureau of Justice Statistics (BJS).” Bureau of Justice Statistics (BJS). N.p., n.d. Web. 08 Sept. 2015.

Dwayne Roberson

Share

How to create Testimonial Carousel using Bootstrap5

Clients' Reviews about Our Services