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The purpose of this paper is to explore the perceived needs of junior nurses working with women with learning disabilities in a secure setting who display violence and aggression; and to contribute to this specialised area of research and to identify potential areas for further post registration education.

The study adopted a qualitative design using thematic analysis. Initial questionnaires were distributed and the results analysed in order to form initial themes. These initial themes were then used to carry out a one-off focus group and this was transcribed verbatim and then analysed using Braun and Clarke thematic analysis to develop final themes.

The findings identified a need for staff to be able to access effective immediate support following incidents of violence and aggression and support be offered within a clear structured environment. Staff indicated that peer supervision be made available and that they also receive adequate education relating to gender specific issues and the use of seclusion.

The research had several limitations. These included a small sample size which was also largely self-selected. Bias may have to be acknowledged in respect of completion of questionnaires depending on their view of participation and what they might be contributing to. Despite this the results do raise further questions such as staff decision making around the use of seclusion.

Implications centred around the organisation’s delivery of education to staff in relation to the clinical decision-making skills they require in order to effectively support women with learning disabilities who display violent and/or aggressive behaviour. The study also has implications for potential supervision structures currently offered within these services.

This paper fulfils a need to explore services for women with a learning disability further and how services can be shaped using current perspective and up to date research in line with recent policy, e.g. Corston Report (Home Office, 2007).

The purpose of this paper is to explore the lived experiences of learning disability nurses working within forensic services, and their views on their practice as a speciality.

A qualitative, semi-structured interview-based design was used and participant's voices were examined through interpretive phenomenological analysis.

Nurses explored a range of topics related to their practice and overall, five superordinate themes were developed. Forensic nursing as being both the same and different to generic nursing, the journey, and the emotional challenge of forensic nursing, the balancing act of everyday practice and the role of language within forensic nursing practice.

Very little research has examined the views of learning disability nurses within the forensic field. This study gives both a voice to these nurses and suggests areas of interest both for research and for clinicians to consider in their practice.

The process of statutory community aftercare for restricted hospital order service users is acknowledged as successful. Previous research examining the attitudes of forensic psychiatrists to the use of restriction orders has indicated that they view them as a useful clinical tool in some circumstances, particularly where there is evidence of previous breakdown of follow‐up. This study, as part of a larger project examining the effectiveness of statutory community aftercare, focused on the attitudes of social supervisors to the process of conditional discharge and their role within it. The findings showed that social supervisors agree that there are positive and negative aspects to the process. They overwhelmingly agreed that the legal framework ensured that service users continued engagement with psychiatric services, leading to enhanced compliance with treatment and follow‐up, but recognised that, at times, the role, because of its control aspect, created tension in the social worker‐service user relationship. Social supervisors suggested that investment should be made into providing appropriate accommodation for this group of people and, where appropriate, access to drug and alcohol misuse services.

Provision of comprehensive diversion services for the mentally disordered who come into conflict with the law offers benefits for patients and all those involved in the process, including the police, crown prosecution service and other agencies. It gives access to the most appropriate disposal for this vulnerable group. This case study of a man who had multiple contacts with the diversion services in Birmingham illustrates the particular difficulties associated with diversion from custody for mentally disordered individuals, particularly where there are multiple problem areas. Examination of the case suggests that in spite of inter‐agency commitment to the philosophy of diversion, in some instances a period spent in custody is unavoidable.

In this chapter, we draw on our study involving interviews with Australians who identify as current self-trackers to discuss why and how they monitor themselves. Our approach for analysing self-tracking practices is based on a sociomaterial perspective, viewing enactments of voluntary self-tracking as shifting heterogeneous assemblages, bringing together diverse actors who are both human and non-human. We use vignettes to illustrate the ways in which our participants enacted self-tracking and to identify some of the diverse meanings and motivations that mediate decisions to self-track and resultant uses of the information thus generated. We found that a varied range of self-tracking practices were taken up by our interviewees, including not only digital devices and methods, but also recording their details using pen-and-paper, or simply maintaining mental awareness and using memory. We identified several agential capacities in our participants’ accounts of why and how they monitor themselves. These capacities are interrelated, but can be loosely grouped under the headings of ‘self-improvement’, ‘exerting control’ and ‘identifying patterns and achieving goals’. They are motivators and facilitators of monitoring practices. The broader sociocultural contexts in which monitoring of the body/self is undertaken were also revealed in the participants’ accounts. These include ideas about the moral virtues of self-responsibility and the individual management of life circumstances to avoid chaos and risk, and the notion that monitoring practices can successfully achieve these virtues.

The LAUSD is the largest school district in the State and is charged with the responsibility of educating over one‐fifth of the children in California. Taken individually, each of the LAUSD’s eleven local districts would rank in the top twenty in the State in terms of student population. The District is LA County’s second largest employer, and with an annual operating and capital budget of over nine billion dollars, it brings together a diverse range of active and dynamic stakeholders. In 2000 the LAUSD found itself at a crossroads. In response to growing criticism and the threat of a State‐mandated break‐up due to the poor performance of their schools, the District created eleven mini‐districts to improve accountability and take instructional programs closer to the people who use them. This paper provides background on the LAUSD’s decentralization effort and power sharing aspects of the District’s self‐imposed break‐up, and recommendations for addressing these issues are postulated.

The study explores the ways hypermasculine aggression is both communicated and resisted in prisons.

It is based on ethnographic observation conducted at two correctional facilities: a mixed-security prison for young men where the author has facilitated conflict transformation workshops since 2006 and a maximum-security prison for men where she has taught a weekly writing class since 2007.

It found that performances of masculinity among both prisoners and prison guards are frequently structured around symbolic expressions of violence, but that both groups also engage in supportive behaviors that communicate the possibility of nonviolent caring male identity.

The study was limited to two correctional institutions in one state in the United States. Conditions at other correctional facilities may lead to different types of gendered performance. Also, in the tense atmosphere of a prison, neither inmates nor corrections officers express themselves fully in the presence of an outside observer.

The violent masculinities valued and practiced in prisons replicate in communities and institutions beyond the prison walls. Attention to the alternative masculinities practiced in correctional institutions can help scholars challenge the destructive ideologies of hegemonic masculinity and reduce its prevalence; it can influence policy makers to establish more humane conditions and procedures of benefit to individuals, families, and communities.

The study is of value to scholars of gender, culture, and social justice; to policy makers interested in criminal justice reform; and to activists and people of conscience seeking to reduce violence on both sides of the bars.