The Academy

Lewis Lawes, who served as warden of Sing Sing Prison from 1920 to 1941, began his career as a Guard (they were called that then) at Clinton Prison in 1905. On arriving in Dannemora by train, Lawes was shown around the institution. Older guards took him aside, he later recalled, "and whispered things": Stay alert, enforce the rules rigidly, never trust an inmate. They handed him a pair of sneakers, to make rounds in silence, "and a big club" for protection. Thus instructed and outfitted, Lawes was taken to a cellblock, and left there alone.

That kind of initiation was asking for trouble, according to Superintendent John J. Maloy, pointing out that it placed in danger not only the unprepared officer but also the inmates under his control. Maloy is trained to know. He heads the DOCS Training Academy, a 50-acre campus on the outskirts of Albany, and 10 regional training centers across the state.

Rookie Correction Officers today - some 1,000 new Officers are appointed in a typical year- receive 440 hours of rigorous and comprehensive training before they are entrusted with the responsibility of supervising prison inmates on their own. The curriculum is a mix of theory and practice. It includes classroom study of inmate psychology and the principles of inmate supervision; laws and rules governing both inmate and staff behavior, such as the new state law criminalizing sexual contact with inmates; physical training for the rigors of prison work; technological training in the use of chemical agents, batons and firearms; health and safety issues such as fire prevention and AIDS awareness, and four weeks on-the-job training with hands-on guidance from experienced officers and supervisors.

Every year, Academy personnel deliver in the neighborhood of two million hours of professional instruction to the 32,000 men and women who staff the Department's institutions and Central Office. In addition to training new Correction Officers, the Academy is responsible for orienting newly recruited nonuniformed civilian staff- teachers, counselors, office workers, maintenance and support staff; health professionals and administrators. And all employees receive ongoing, in-service training throughout their careers with the Department.

The current level of excellence was not attained overnight. A beginning in the 1930's was interrupted by World War 11 and not resumed until the 1960's. Giant steps were taken when money became available after the deadly 1971 riot at Attica. The Department's decision in the 1980's to seek American Correctional Association (ACA) accreditation raised staff development standards, and the regional centers introduced in 1989 brought improvements in administration and consistency.

Two years ago, Commissioner Goord underscored the Department's commitment to professional training by placing it at the top of the organization chart. Training is now under a Superintendent who serves on the Commissioner's Executive Staff. Maloy, previously Superintendent at Washington, was appointed to this new position in December, 1997.

Centralization and professionalization

The story begins the year Babe Ruth slammed 60 home runs for the Yankees. Before 1927, calls for training were occasionally heard, from Lawes and others. But the Prison Department's bare-bones central administration was never able to muster resources for systematic training.

Then, effective January 1, 1927, a Department of Correction was created in New York. A cabinet-level commissioner was given authority over not only the four prisons (Auburn, Sing Sing, Clinton and Great Meadow), but also the state's adult reformatories (Albion, Elmira and Bedford), hospitals for the criminally insane (Matteawan and Dannemora), and the institution for defective delinquents at Napanoch.

Two years later, in 1929, 13 inmates and a principal keeper were killed and cell-houses and shops were destroyed in inmate insurrections at Clinton and Auburn.

The government response seemed typical: Appoint a commission to investigate the system. But unlike most commissions, this one got results. It was loaded with career corrections professionals, including three future presidents of the American Prison Association, today's American Correctional Association (ACA): Chairman Sam A. Lewisohn (a member of the State Commission of Correction), Dr Walter N. Thayer, Jr. (Corrections Commissioner) and Dr Walter M. Wallack (subsequently warden of Wallkill).

Dubbed the Lewisohn Commission, it quickly produced a blueprint for the future of corrections. Prisons would become rehabilitative institutions with progressive programs of classification, individualized study and treatment, and education and vocational training. The blueprint called for reduced security institutions (Wallkill would open in 1932), and for strengthened central administration including new directors of personnel (achieved in 1932) and education (1935).

Central Guard School

Lewisohn also recommended staff training at a formal "school," especially since guards would now be expected to play a role in the rehabilitation of offenders. The first step was taken in 1931, when four-week, in-service programs were set up at Auburn, Sing Sing, Clinton, Great Meadow and just opened Attica. The schools were later extended to other facilities, and summer sessions for "physical instruction" and jujitsu were added.

Officers attended the in-service schools on their own time. There couldn't have been much of that: They worked six days and 60-plus hours a week, with just two weeks vacation. Relief came when legislation, effective July 1, 1937, established an eight-hour day for employees of prisons, state hospitals and other institutions. The Department calculated that the reduction in hours would require the rapid hiring of536 new guards. Corrections Commissioner Edward P Mulrooney saw this as an opportunity to finally organize a central training school.

The new Wallkill Prison was selected as the site, partly by virtue of its central location and partly because, as the system's only reduced-security institution, it had no walls or tightly guarded gates to impede the activities of trainees and instructors.

The eight-week, 320-hour curriculum would "promote professionalized service" by stressing communications skills, the principles of human behavior and the operations of the criminal justice system. Three hours a day would be devoted to military drill, calisthenics, boxing, ju-jitsu, use of gas and firearms training.

The Central Guard School opened in November, 1936, with 80 recruits. The following fall, eight-week in-service sessions were offered for staff appointed before the establishment of the school; participants could be no more than 34 years old and were required to pay their own expenses. Later, in 1941, the Guard School organized advanced courses which were conducted outside working hours at selected institutions.

It would be hard to overstate the significance of the Central Guard School to the Department of Correction and to the corrections community at large. It was the first school of its kind operated by a state prison system (the New York City Correction Department started a Keepers School in 1927). It succeeded in professionalizing the workforce. By using staff from across the state as instructors, the school promoted the goal of making a unified system of the diverse institutions of the Department. Officials of other prison jurisdictions, police departments and the courts came to lecture and to learn. Nevertheless, the school fell victim to the budget ax after less than three years' operation. It closed on June 30, 1939.

Funding was restored a year later but the Central Guard School at Wallkill closed forever in April, 1942. Wartime travel restrictions had been imposed, and military inductions had rendered recruitment and training a hopeless cause

Between training schools

Even before Pearl Harbor, draft boards were chipping away at the Department's workforce. After the "day of infamy," the pace quickened. Civil service lists were depleted, and men were hired, on a war duration basis, who had not been called into the military because of age or physical conditions which would normally have disqualified them from prison work as well. Eventually, in the words of a department official, they were hiring "almost any man who was able to stand up unassisted."

For these men who would serve only until the regular officers returned, an abbreviated course was developed. The course was modeled on an adaptation made at Great Meadow for its own staff when the Guard School first closed in 1939. The "introductory course" was conducted on a semi-correspondence basis - classes were taught by facility security supervisors and teachers, and assignments and quizzes were forwarded for evaluation to Wallkill where a few Guard School staff remained.

With the mass return of the regular guards at war's end, recruitment and training of rookie Officers lost its urgency. Responsibility reverted to the individual institutions. Without a mandate and without funding, most institutions let matters slide, and the state of recruit training deteriorated to pre-Wallkill days. First-day stories of officers hired in the 1950's vary little: Reporting for line-up as directed by letter from Albany, they were issued keys and told to "follow the inmates."

Many wardens and superintendents considered this situation intolerable and began to devise ways around the lack of designated resources. In the mid-1950's, for example, Clinton started an orientation and training program for new Officers. Three weeks were spent in the company of senior Officers, and trainees were tested on Correction Law and Department and facility rules. In the early 1960's, Green Haven started daily lunch hour in-service sessions. A unit of material would be covered for five consecutive days, allowing most of the officers to be relieved, brown bags in hand, to attend what were euphemistically called "refresher courses" - most of the participants had had no previous training at all.

Some of these make-do arrangements were quite good, but they were inconsistent and undependable. They relied on the imagination and resolve of individual staff members. If the individual was promoted or reassigned, the program disappeared with him or her.

Special training programs

The suspension of centralized recruit training gave the Department time to look after two special classes of personnel. A course for matrons (the official title of women Officers until 1960) began at Albion in 1945 and at Westfield State Farm in Bedford Hills the next year. In 1953, special courses were developed for the correction hospital attendants at Matteawan and Dannemora state hospitals.

Also in 1953, the Legislature created the position of Director of Correctional Training. No progress was made on returning recruit training to the pre-war level of excellence, but a unique In-service program - the annual Moran Memorial Institute - was developed and flourished for two decades.

Frederick A. Moran, Chairman of the Board of Parole, had played a leading role in establishing the Institute and, on his death in 1952, it was renamed in his honor The Institute, held on the grounds of St. Lawrence University in Canton, had begun modestly in 1947 as a three-day summer workshop. Within three years, it had grown to a week-long Institute on Delinquency and Crime, with participants eligible to earn college credits.

Later, in 1958, in-service courses for Department of Correction staff were held on the campus the week prior to the Institute. Typically the institute would draw several hundred workers from prisons and jails,juvenile agencies, probation and parole, the courts and police, colleges and universities, plus many lecturers from out-of-state agencies.

The last Moran Institute was held in 1970. Plans were afoot to bring the state's correctional system up to modem standards. Funds for Moran, which could be attended by only a handful of people a year, would be reallocated to an inter-agency training effort to serve all the system's components - state prisons, local jails, probation and parole.

Matteawan Academy

In the meantime, the Department had at long last resumed formal recruit training. in 1965, a brick building on Matteawan State Hospital's old Colony Farm - where Beacon now stands - was converted to an academy. The first session began on November 29, 1965, with 27 male and female Officers and correction hospital attendants. About a dozen sessions were held a year, with classes of 25-30, adequate for a normal year's intake of about 300 new Officers.

The three-week, 120-hour curriculum covered psychology, report writing, motivation and leadership and Puerto Rican customs and culture as well as "guns and gas" and military training. Instructors were deployed from the Department's institutions and Central Office, assisted regularly by outside experts from the State Police, New York City Police Department, State Commission of Correction, Division of Identification and Intelligence, Narcotic Addiction Control Commission, Department of Mental Hygiene and local colleges.

A new academy for a new Department

Restructuring and riot had given birth to an excellent training program in the 1930's. Forty years later, it was deja vu all over again. On January 1, 1971, the state's adult institutional and parole agencies merged in a new Department of Correctional Services. Nine months later, there was a devastating riot at Attica, followed by investigations and a reexamination, not just of Attica, but of correctional practices throughout the nation. There emerged a consensus of public support for reform.

Among indicated reforms was truly professional training for prison personnel. The new administration had already determined to upgrade its training program. But now, in the aftermath of the riot, funding materialized - with federal grants supplementing state appropriations. The Department would expand recruit training to a full 13 weeks, dwarfing even the old Wallkill program.

The first class of Officers to receive the expanded course graduated on June 6, 1972.

Training at this time was conducted at the State Police Academy, which from its opening in 1970 had replaced Matteawan as the site of the recruit program. With the decision to step up from three to 13 weeks, however, the Department would need its own academy. A site was found on New Scotland Avenue on the outskirts of Albany. The state entered into a contract with the Roman Catholic Diocese of Albany to lease the Mater Christi Seminary.

Since the mid- 1950's, Mater Christi had functioned as a "minor seminary," where candidates for the priesthood would receive the equivalent of an associate's degree before continuing their education at a "major seminary." By the 1970's, however, most aspirants to the priesthood had already completed college, eliminating the need for post-high school level seminaries.

Located on 50 beautifully-manicured acres, Mater Christi offered a three-story main building, with offices, classrooms, bedrooms, kitchen and dining facilities, and a chapel suitable for use as an auditorium. The seminary grounds also included a gymnasium; an outdoor swimming pool; and a small house behind the main building, formerly a residence for a small number of Carmelite Sisters who did domestic work for priests on the seminary faculty. Dubbed "the annex," the house is now used as a meeting place for as many as 60-70 participants.

The new Training Academy opened in the summer of 1972. The Department leased the property from the Albany Diocese until 1987, when, with a legislative appropriation of $2.7 million, it exercised its option to buy.

Until the early 1990's, the Academy was shared by three state agencies: DOCS, the Commission of Correction and the Division of Probation and Correctional Alternatives. The shared occupancy suggested the generic name, "New York State Post-Adjudicatory Training Academy." Not surprisingly, this awkward appellation was never used.

Population boom and budget crunch

As the Mater Christi Academy was getting started in 1972, so was a rise in the prison population, from 12,500 to more than 71,000 today. The next two decades saw a constant struggle for resources: money, beds and staff. The relentless pressure to get additional Officers into the prisons severely strained the Department's new training program.

Classroom space at the new Academy could not accommodate the steady parade of new Officers. From the beginning, it was necessary to find temporary auxiliary training facilities. In fact, the first class to hold graduation exercises at the Academy was actually trained on the campus of the State University of New York at Plattsburgh. Plattsburgh was used into the early 1980's. A former Division for Youth institution in Otisville was used in the late 1970's, until it was converted to a state facility in 1977. The old Matteawan academy site was recycled, until it became Camp Beacon. The YMCA's Silver Bay Conference Center on Lake George was used in the late '70's, and LaSalette Seminary in Altamont served as an auxiliary academy in the early to mid-1980's. A former Catholic women's college in Harriman was used throughout the 1980's, and women's dorms at Keuka College in Penn Yan were used in the late '80's. And, while a portion of the old Gowanda Psychiatric Center was being readied for conversion to a prison in 1994, it also functioned as an auxiliary academy.

Aside from the runaway prison expansion, these were years of budgetary retrenchment for all state agencies. The ambitious 13-week recruit program could not survive: Not only was it expensive, it did not deliver new Officers to the prisons fast enough. The program was cut to eight weeks in 1976, and then shaved down to as low as three weeks in 1979. Training duration then fluctuated until 1992, when the current program was established - seven weeks at the Academy and four weeks OJT including at least two in a maximum-security facility.

The Academy as a university

The DOCS Training Academy, with its regional centers, is in every sense an institution of higher learning. The Academy is accredited by the ACA, and several of its specialty schools (such as those for Sergeants and Lieutenants) are separately accredited. The nationally-recognized organization PONSI (Policy on Non-collegiate Sponsored Instruction) awards 16 college credits to graduates of the Department's recruit training, as does Empire State College. Officers who go on to attend the supervisory schools can earn as much as a year of college credits.

The Academy incorporates standards and guidelines of a variety of outside organizations. In addition to PONSI and the ACA, training conforms to standards of the State Commission of Correction, the Office of Safety and Health Administration, and the Municipal Police Training Council (the state Division of Criminal Justice Services' unit responsible for certifying peace officers).

"Faculty" of the Academy and the regional training centers are everyday Department staff, on leave from their regular jobs. Correction Officers, being the largest single class of personnel, constitute the majority of trainers, but nearly every other group is represented as well: Teachers and counselors, medical personnel, business office employees and administrators from the institutions and the Central Office. One goal of rotating staff is to ensure that all teachers have recent, hands-on experience at a correctional facility. Rotation also extends to great numbers of employees the opportunity to teach and grow personally and professionally.

Stints as instructor range from full-time to a couple of courses a year Most teaching assignments require the employee to complete a two-week instructor development course. Specialties such as chemical agents and weapons training require an additional two-weeks of special instructor training.

The current Correction Officer training includes staples such as contraband control, inmate counts and other parts of the daily prison routine, interpersonal communications skills, physical and military training plus firearms and chemical agents. Recent additions to the curriculum include legal issues, appreciation for diversity, health issues (TB, hepatitis, and HIV), teamwork, correctional dynamics and recognizing abnormal behavior.

New non-uniformed staff receive a 40-hour orientation course. All employees, security and civilian, receive 16 hours of facility familiarization when transferring between institutions.

All employees are given on-going in-service training. Uniformed employees receive 40 hours annually. Non-uniformed staff are also given 40 hours if their responsibilities involve routine contact with inmates (e.g., teachers, nurses, and commissary clerks) or 16 hours if they are in only occasional contact with inmates.

Civilians are introduced to prison security and personal safety issues through the evolving RECAB course on Recognizing, Evaluating and Controlling Aggressive Behavior (RECAB was formerly known as NAPPI, for "Non-Aggressive Psychological and Physical Intervention.") Other examples of civilian courses are diversity policies, first aid and other health issues, time management, basics of supervision, computer literacy and defensive driving, to name just a few. Job-specific training is also offered, such as operating new computer software systems.

In addition to formal learning, the Academy functions as a resource center for the Department. It is developing links to a variety of information sources such as libraries, the National Institute of Corrections Academy, the SUNY School of Criminal Justice and various criminal justice agencies throughout the country. The Academy is also the Department's liaison for employee tuition reimbursement programs, advising on procedures and processing applications.

Just as every college and university has its non-academic side, the Academy serves non-instructional functions as well. The Academy is frequently used as a conference center for statewide meetings of groups including plant superintendents, crisis intervention teams, stewards, health services, personnel administrators and Corcraft. The auditorium is the site of awards presentations and medal of honor ceremonies. The fields and pavilion are used for the DOCS Olympics and the Central Office summer picnic.

On June 29, the Department dedicated the new employee memorial in the front of the Academy. The memorial honors employees who died in the line of duty as a result of inmate actions.

And, like a college or university - or like the 69 correctional facilities of the Department - the Academy strives to be a good neighbor and member of the community. The outdoor pool on the grounds has been used by the City of Albany for 30 years or more. The gymnasium is at the service of the community on weekends. The Academy fields are in continuous use in summers by community softball leagues with the provision that they comply with the Department's alcohol-free and low-noise policies - so as not to disturb the residences that surround the Academy on three sides.

Entering the new millennium

After a long stop-and-go journey across a route shaped by riots, a world war, exploding prison censuses, and the whims of the economy, the Department's Training Division has caught up with the demands of the large, modern DOCS system. It is not slowing down.

Mandatory training has been in place for an uninterrupted 35 years. To the basics of prison routines and physical training, a broad range of professional subject matter has been added, assimilated and refined.

New administrative structures assure that progress will be ongoing. The Academy's chief administrator has been elevated to the Commissioner's Executive Staff. The creation of regional training centers has streamlined and standardized the delivery of training. Planning and performance monitoring have been enhanced by computerizing statewide data. Evolving technologies, such as teleconferencing and telemedicine, will play a prominent role in the future.

As we enter the new millennium, New Yorkers can rest assured that their corrections professionals will be well-prepared for the demands of one of the toughest assignments in the world - running a correctional system that meets the needs of inmates, staff and the public, on a professional and well-trained basis.

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