From Classroom to Prison Cell: Young Offenders' Perception of Their School Experience

Abstract

The purpose of this study, conducted in three New Zealand youth justice residential facilities, was to explore the compulsory school experience, as perceived by young people who have committed serious offences, to create an anthology of their stories, and to add the voices and their views to the literature on young people at risk of criminal offending. The focus of this study was based on interviews with 25 young people (19 males, 6 females) aged between 14 years and 16 years (inclusive) who were either on remand or on 'supervision with residence' for violent or other serious crimes. Using an interpretive phenomenological method of analysis, six essential themes were revealed - alienation, attitude, moral reasoning, victimisation and a sense of unfairness - with the dominant theme being 'treated unfairly by school personnel’. A significant finding was that while schools do not cause a young person to commit crimes, it is the cumulative effect of negative school experiences that propel a vulnerable student towards chronic criminal offending. What also became apparent was the unique opportunity that schools provide to interrupt the evolutional highway to youth offending through a process of early identification and timely intervention.