Podcast: Treat kids in detention like kids, not criminals, says award-winning researcher Sanne Oostermeijer

Most of us know what a prison typically looks like. Cells, bars, locks, barbed wire, high fences – generally pretty harsh places. But picture this instead. Not hundreds of beds but just eight, for the whole facility. Located in the neighbourhood, not hundreds of kilometres out of the way. An environment that feels more like a home than a jail; semi-open, not locked up, and where staff and residents have dynamic and respectful relationships.

It’s not a pipedream – it’s the idea that won Dr Sanne Oostermeijer and architect Matthew Dwyer the $30,000 Melbourne Design Challenge in 2018. Sanne and Matthew’s idea outlined best practices for the design of youth justice facilities, which can support young people onto a better path after time in detention. On today’s episode, Sanne shares how good design can lead to better outcomes and safer communities. 

Here are the links we mention in this episode:

Note

This is an edited and reworked version of a conversation Sanne had with Jess Sanders for our Community Check-in video series in 2021. We’ve re-recorded the questions with this season’s podcast host for consistency across all episodes.

And you can keep scrolling to read the full transcript of this conversation.

Sophie Raynor

Welcome to the Worth A Second Chance podcast, where we explore true stories, challenges and solutions from the frontlines of Australia's youth justice systems. My name is Sophie Raynor.

Most of us know what a prison typically looks like. Cells, bars, locks, barbed wire, high fences.... generally pretty harsh places. But picture this instead. Not hundreds of beds but just eight, for the whole facility. Located in the neighbourhood, not hundreds of kilometres out of the way. An environment that feels more like a home than a jail; semi-open, not locked up, and where staff and residents have dynamic and respectful relationships.

It’s not a pipedream – it’s the idea that won Dr Sanne Oostermeijer and architect Matthew Dwyer the thirty thousand dollar Melbourne Design Challenge in 2018. Sanne and Matthew’s idea outlined best practices for the design of youth justice facilities, which could support young people’s rehabilitation… and also help them get onto a better path after time in detention.

Sanne Oostermeijer

When we think about the sort of large-scale or high-security facilities that we usually see, we're actually communicating to that young person, that they're being punished. But I think even further than that, we’re communicating that they're a criminal. So, that really reinforces for a young person, who's still developing their sense of self, their identity, that reinforces that idea they are a criminal.

Sophie Raynor

On today’s episode, Sanne shares how good design can lead to better outcomes and safer communities. 

Hi, Sanne. Can you start by introducing yourself?

Sanne Oostermeijer

Yeah, sure. So, I'm currently a research fellow at the University of Melbourne School of Population and Global Health in the Centre for Mental Health. I also do some work in the youth justice space. So, I moved to Melbourne about two or three years ago, from the Netherlands, where I worked on an evaluation of the small-scale youth justice facilities there. When I moved to Melbourne, I started working on a project with my partner who works in architecture around, I guess, looking at best practice facilities around the world. And we've put together some design guidelines around that for Victoria.

Sophie Raynor

And so we know in the Netherlands and in several other countries in Europe and elsewhere that prisons are designed very differently from how they are in Australia. A few years ago Jesuit Social Services went on a pair of research trips to view justice facilities in Germany, Norway, Spain, the US, the UK, and New Zealand… I’ll link those reports the notes for this episode. But on those trips we saw first-hand just how effective small, homelike justice facilities are in rehabilitating people and reducing their risk of reoffending. But then here in Victoria, where we both live, the government’s currently building a new youth prison at Cherry Creek west of Melbourne, 140 beds, and a new adult prison with twelve hundred beds at Chisolm Road, about twenty kilometres north of Geelong. That to me seems the opposite of the Dutch model, and maybe there’s an argument to be made that there’s unacceptable risk involved with smaller or more open facilities. But, as a person who studies the design those facilities, can you tell me – why do we need them over bigger prisons?

Sanne Oostermeijer

Yeah, so, I guess, we started thinking about, what do we expect the youth justice system to do? Or what do we expect in specifically the custodial system. So, really, what we want is to divert young people away from a life of crime, or further entrenching them in the justice system with, I guess, because custody being the most severe intervention for a young person.

And ideally, we would want very small numbers of young people in custody, or maybe even zero young people, if that's a possibility. And so when you look at, I guess, important factors within a young person's life that play a role, and help a young person either choose a different life path or to stay away from any offending behaviours, we, for example, see that education and schools is a really important social connections to the community and to their family. So when you then look at, I guess, large-scale facilities that are often pretty far away from the community and from a young person's community. That actually is counterproductive, I guess, in maintaining or building those things; those elements that play such an important role in in helping a young person develop a different life path or I guess, to promote like healthy, positive development that listen development.

Sophie Raynor

So for those very few young people who are in a custodial setting, what does an ideal facility involve?

Sanne Oostermeijer

So yeah, when we start thinking about the ideal youth justice facility, I guess we want like a safe and healthy environment for both young people and for staff. And what we see in our current facilities, this, you know, several reports that highlight that actually at the moment, it's not that safe for either staff or for young people. And, yeah, we want to support staff and in developing positive relationships. It's important that we can have individual approaches. So that's where I guess the size plays a role. And where sort of smaller facilities, it's more easy to have that individual approach and to build a personal relationship with young people. And when we think about maintaining social connections, or maintaining connections to school and education in the community, that also becomes more difficult when facilities are further away, family has a harder time visiting. And even I guess, the youth support services that have to access that young person, that becomes a bit more difficult as well.

So, when we look at, I guess, best practice facilities, in Europe, and in the US, we see that small-scale, local, or community-integrated facilities are actually much better equipped to build and maintain those elements that play such an important role in, in a young person's life. And on top of that, I think when we think about the goal being a small number, or maybe even zero young people in these facilities, we saw decarceration, effectively, we need facilities that are flexible and adaptable. And I guess when you have a large-scale facility, it's not really best equipped to sort of respond to respond to that or to be flexible and adaptable when the needs change. So yeah, that's those are just a few things that come to mind.

Sophie Raynor

And there’s a lot of talk about therapeutic models of care in youth justice settings – maybe most publicly in the Northern Territory, where in 2017 the Royal Commission into the Protection and Detention of Children recommended therapeutic approaches in detention settings. But talk me through this slowly – what do we actually mean when we say therapeutic in the context of correctional facilities?

Sanne Oostermeijer

Yeah, so I guess when we say therapeutic, we mean having a good effect on body and well-being and health. And we see that a lot of young people in custody struggle with mental health problems, and have experienced trauma and neglect. So it's really important to think about providing a therapeutic environment. And the way we have thought about it in the design guide is, I guess there's sort of several layers to it. So there's good design. So we can think about having access to nature or gardens, but also good ventilation, having access to natural light. And then secondly, you can take that a little bit further and say that the environment shouldn't do any further harm to the person in that in that environment. And then we take that even a little bit further. And I think that's sort of where the therapeutic part comes, comes in is that the environment can actually play a role in reducing stress and promoting actively promoting wellbeing. And so what we've seen in the small-scale youth justice facilities is that basically, they look like a living space, they kind of look home like, because, yeah, I guess those elements that play a role in wellbeing are actually the elements that we've applied to our homes, which makes a lot of sense.

Sophie Raynor

Yeah it does make sense. Because I guess if you’re wanting a detention facility to help a young person rehabilitate, and address the drivers of their offending, and change their behaviour, it’s going to be a lot harder to behave well if you’re not feeling well. And then maybe for a young person in detention, if you're in a space that's… nicer, and which looks more like a home, that you feel more worthy of having those things in your life. And it’s sort of a demonstration from the justice sector, saying you are allowed these things, you're allowed nice things, and you’re allowed access to a nice space that makes you feel safe and comfortable.

Sanne Oostermeijer

Completely right there. So when we think about the sort of large-scale or high-security facilities that we usually see, we're actually communicating to that young person, that they're being punished. But I think even further than that, we’re communicating that they're a criminal, and that they were an offender. So, that really reinforces for a young person, who's still developing their sense of self, their identity, that reinforces that idea that, that they are a criminal. Which, again, when we think about what do we want from the custodial youth justice facilities, we want to divert them away from a life of crime. So we want them to be able to imagine themselves as a normal, healthy young person with the ability to achieve their life goals. And what we're actually doing when we're communicating that element of punishment and sort of reinforcing that identity as a criminal, we're actually creating the opposite, I guess we're not allowing them to imagine themselves as a healthy teenager, who could who has the ability to achieve their life goals.

So, I think why it's important, or what's important about the small-scale youth justice facilities, it's, I guess, that convey a sense of safety and stability in being home- like, and I think what's important to mention, because sometimes you hear people kind of thinking about small-scale facilities or home like facilities, you know, it shouldn't be a holiday. But even though the environment or the design might be more home, like, it doesn't mean it's a holiday, it's actually not a holiday at all. So when you I think the larger-scale facilities have allow young people in that space, because it's so large-scale, and they're just one of many young people. And one of many young persons, it's easier to dissociate a bit, I think, in that space, and dissociate a bit from why you're there, or what you're supposed to do. So, in that sense of small-scale facility is not a holiday at all, because there's a lot of focus on thinking about your goals, and what you want to achieve thinking about your behavior reflecting on your behavior. And that's definitely something that we've heard from young people that we've met in these small-scale facilities. And some sometimes they either say, Oh, I prefer a large-scale facility, because I need to talk all the time here, and I don't like talking. So yeah, I think so while the environment is home, like, because you want to create that sort of sense of safety and stability. It's not like it's not like holiday or at all, they're actually doing a lot of work around reflecting on themselves, on their behaviour and on their life goals.

Sophie Raynor

It sounds like it’s quite easy for a young person in a large-scale facility to slide under the radar and avoid that kind of work on themselves that you were just describing. And there are many good reasons why a young person might want to do that – I’m not saying they’re, you know, copping out of the work on themselves; I’m thinking of the fact that two-thirds of young people in detention here in Victoria have experienced trauma or abuse or neglect, and half of them have involvement with child protection, and half again are receiving mental health treatment. It’s a really complex group of young people who have been through some really difficult things, so opening up could be hard. And I’m wondering about one other element of this, and that’s self-esteem – talk to me about how building self-esteem helps reduce rates of reoffending, and how the built environment of a youth justice facility can contribute to this?

Sanne Oostermeijer

Oh, yes, sure. Um, so, yeah, again, I guess we want to help young people achieve their life goals without engaging in crime or inflicting harm on people. And we see that young people in custody often have a history of trauma and abuse, and they struggle with mental health problems, and also often come from, I guess, socially disadvantaged backgrounds. So, yeah, and their offending behaviours, or crime is often also a response to a lot of those difficulties. So I think we need to sort of acknowledge that there are broader psychosocial factors that play a role in this young person's life. Not to say that, that would be an excuse, but I think it would be I guess, oversimplifying it if we would ignore those factors as well. We've looked at using a resilience framework or resilience theory to look at how youth justice facilities can best help young people achieve their life goals. And so resilience being the ability to respond to adversity in life using or utilising your social and emotional skills. And so that's where self-esteem and coping mechanisms play a really important role. And yeah, so and it also offers, I guess, a more holistic approach to, to the whole thing. I guess when you acknowledge that those psychosocial factors play a really important role, and that taking that more holistic approach, and acknowledging that young people have an experience a lot of adversities in their life. We want to equip these young people to be able to respond to that and work through that. So in order to do that, you want to build their self-esteem, and you want to build their coping mechanisms.

Sophie Raynor

Thanks, Sanne.

That was Sanne Oostermeijer speaking to Worth a Second Chance about how small-scale youth justice facilities can enable rehabilitation and reduce reoffending.

Worth a Second Chance is a community campaign from Jesuit Social Services. We’re calling for a more fair, humane and effective youth justice system – and we need your help. Learn more, and join the campaign at worthasecondchance.com.au

Thanks to Sanne Oostermeijer for speaking with us today, and you can find new conversations every second Thursday. My name is Sophie Raynor, and this was Worth A Second Chance.

Sophie Raynor