Corrections_Today_Winter_2024-2025_Vol.86_No.4

PAST PRESIDENT’S CORNER

recruitment, private corrections companies, commissary products, drones, and drone detection sys tems, Tattoo removal and hundreds of other products and services. During the 154 th Congress of Correction, 202 correctional agen cies and facilities were accredited or re-accredited, including 19 interna tional facilities. At the 99 th Congress of Correction accreditation was still a dream for even the most progres sive corrections professionals. At the 99 th Congress of Correction accreditation was still a dream for even the most progressive corrections professionals. Workshops in Nashville focused on current and future challenges in corrections, promising programs, mental health services for offenders, employee wellness, security, staff ing challenges and reentry services. Women in leadership positions, correctional education, dementia in a growing older population in cor rectional facilities, the Prison Rape Elimination Act and the lasting impact of COVID on staff and of fenders were just a small fraction of the workshops offered. Growing population Yet, so much has changed in the world of corrections since 1969. It is safe to say that the vast majority of the products that were featured in the Exhibit Hall did not even

209 TH CONGRESS OF CORRECTION

Adobe Stock/Orlando Florin Rosu

exist 55 years ago. While some of the demands on corrections will always be the same, (i.e., public safety, managing and operating safe, humane, and clean facilities, return ing offenders to their communities, better than when they came into the prisons, jails, and juvenile facili ties.) the world is changing at warp speed and correctional agencies and corrections professionals must keep up with what is happening, not only in criminal justice, but trends and events happening outside the field of corrections. Domestic and international ter rorism, another pandemic, world population growth, global warming, the decline of the environment and the growth of cybercrime, human trafficking, and the global produc tion and sale of illegal drugs are not just topics for a sci-fi novel,

these are serious issues that will impact the corrections field for years to come. The future will be here soon Each day, the population of the earth increases by about 225,000 people. By 2079, it is estimated that the world’s population will be 10.4 billion people (depend ing on which population source is used). Today, the earth’s popula tion is 8,070,347,100. This will be an increase of approximately, 2,329,652,900 or 28.9 %. India and China, alone, account for roughly 35% of the world’s population. To put it another way, since the 99 th Congress of Correction, the popula tion of the world has doubled. The U.S. Census Bureau projections predict our country’s population

Winter 2024-2025 | Corrections Today

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