Jails in California and Utah have begun the initiative of implementing gender responsive programming within their institutions. This is important and beneficial for all of the women offenders involved because it means that their needs are going to be met be it physically or emotionally. Gender responsiveness is a necessary tool when dealing with women offenders because it allows correctional facilities to look at an offender's past and give them aid when dealing with their likelihood of getting involved with crime based upon their social factors such as poverty level, lack of education and more.
Facilities must be able to acknowledge that men and women are different and must be treated differently when in their care. Women rely on relationships more heavily than men and be able to understand that many have a history of victimization within their close relationships. These things paired with a more emotional approach to offender care will help the women who exit facilities when their time is complete steer clear of things that will land them back in prison or jail and hopefully have a better socioeconomic status after all of the education that they will gain through being in a gender responsive program.
The only problem with programming like this is that all women are not created equal. All come from different backgrounds and while many may have a history of victimization, a handful will not. People need to be treated simply as people first with the understanding that all people are different. Individualized care paired with gender responsive programs will be the most successful combo of offender treatment programming because it breaks down the system individually and then by gender so that everything is more personalized and successful.
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