Mission
The mission of NIJ is to foster and disseminate knowledge and tools derived from objective and rigorous scientific research to inform efforts that promote safety and advance justice.
Strategy
NIJ’s approach to accomplishing its mission involves achieving four goals:
Invest in Needed Research: The Institute supports basic and applied, intramural and extramural scientific research to develop needed knowledge and tools to advance policy and practice in eight broad research areas, primarily through a competitive grant program:
- Crime prevention and control.
- Youth justice.
- Victimization — experiences, supports, and services.
- Forensic and investigative sciences.
- Justice systems operations — effectiveness, efficiency, and fairness.
- Equipment performance standards and testing.
- Technology.
Identifying the needs of criminal justice practitioners and agencies plays a critical role in how the Institute sets its agenda.
The Institute develops and refines its research priorities by:
- Engaging with its primary stakeholders, representing policymakers, practitioners, service
providers, community-based entities, and researchers. - Assessing the state of research and identifying knowledge gaps by reviewing NIJ-funded research as well as that supported by other federal agencies, academic and research institutions, and other public
and private sector organizations. - Investing in research activities on topics mandated by executive and congressional branches.
Build Research Capacity: The Institute seeks to expand the justice research knowledge infrastructure, including researchers, data, software products, and institutions, by:
- Increasing the pool of researchers engaged in safety and justice research through research assistantships, fellowships, and support for early-career researchers.
- Fostering development and expansion of practitioners engaged in research as well as researchers embedded in practitioner, service provider, and community-based entities.
- Applying innovative technology solutions that increase data usage by practitioner, service provider, and community-based entities and enable data integration to uncover new knowledge.
- Enhancing existing knowledge repositories such as the National Archive of Criminal Justice Data and the National Criminal Justice Reference Service Virtual Library.
Translate and Disseminate Research: The Institute fosters the implementation of research knowledge products through strategic outreach designed to give policymakers, practitioners, and communities the best available evidence to make decisions and advance practice. The foundation of the Institute’s process is engagement with practitioners and other key experts and stakeholders who provide unique insights into how research findings can address the challenges of safety and justice. This involves:
- Translating research findings into accessible and sound products by supporting activities like CrimeSolutions.ojp.gov.
- Engaging in outreach to support the uptake of evidence-based practices in the field.
- Supporting research on the best approaches to successful field implementation.
Measure Performance and Impact: To ensure that our research investments produce the intended outcomes and benefits, the Institute:
- Supports independent assessment of NIJ-funded research projects and secondary analysis of research findings.
- Routinely assesses each research portfolio’s return on investment.
- Ensures grantee compliance with award reporting, accounting, and deliverable requirements through training, technical assistance, and other grantee support mechanisms.
- Reviews and audits grantee performance and compliance with grant conditions.
- Rigorously and routinely measures the accessibility, implementation, and impact of knowledge products.
Cross-Cutting Themes
Five cross-cutting themes support NIJ’s research investments and dissemination activities:
Research Integrity: The integrity of the research the Institute supports is essential to the validity and relevance of the knowledge generated by our investments. NIJ awardees must demonstrate research independence and integrity, including appropriate human subject protection safeguards.
Fairness in the Application of Justice: The Institute is committed to advancing the fairness of the justice system, prioritizing research that includes consideration and measurement of variations in access to justice as well as the implications of research findings for a variety of populations.
Multi-disciplinary Perspectives in Research: The Institute prioritizes research that proposes rigorous designs embodying a wide range of disciplines, methods, and research perspectives. The Institute gives special consideration to proposals with methods that are rigorous and include the professional expertise and people closest to the studied issues.
Implementation Science: The Institute’s mission focuses on the development and uptake of knowledge products to promote safety and advance justice. Consequently, it fosters research-promoting methods and strategies that facilitate the implementation of evidence-based practice by practitioners and policymakers as well as communities.
Global Perspective: The Institute recognizes that the global research community has important knowledge and tools to share in the service of advancing safety and justice. The Institute embraces opportunities to share research originating in the United States with its international counterparts and to incorporate their research into the Institute’s work.
Both our long- and short-term priorities are reflected in the notifications of funding opportunities we release annually. See forthcoming, current, and expired notifications. Additionally, see the Forensic Science Strategic Research Plan.