Database of Criminal Justice Needs for Innovation: Requirements for Developers and Funders: User Guide

• NCJ Number: 254579
• Author(s): John S. Hollywood, Brian A. Jackson, Annie Brothers, Mark Barrett, Dulani Woods, Michael J.D. Vermeer
• Date Published: February 2020
• Length: 37 pages
• Agencies: NIJ-Sponsored

Annotation

This User Guide provides a database of all the needs generated during the first 5 years of the Priority Criminal Justice Needs Initiative (PCINI), which assesses and prioritizes technology needs across the criminal justice community.

Abstract

This effort is a component of the National Institute of Justice’s (NIJ’s) National Law Enforcement and Correction Technology Center (NLECTC) System, which is an integral part of NIJ’s science and technology program, This program supports innovation within criminal justice; however, inclusion in PCINI does not signify approval or endorsement of a technology by NIJ or the RAND Corporation. Specifically, this report provides documentation and user instructions for the database of the PCINI’s needs for innovations. Since 2015, the PCINI has published on behalf of NIJ just over 20 studies that identify and prioritize criminal justice needs for innovation, including both sector-wide advisory panels and workshops on special topics. The database contains summaries of the PCINIs studies and captures all the needs for criminal justice innovation that have resulted from these studies. The database further provides three tools for selecting and reviewing needs, including a navigable, collapsible outline, a visualization tool for selecting needs through push button menu options, and a standard Microsoft Excel table with filter. Also included in the database are Excel PivotTables and PivotCharts for users to create their own displays of needs by study, applicable technology, and priority. The database and this User Guide assume that users have a basic familiarity with Excel and can use the tables, filters, and PivotTable interfaces.