Originally published: . Volume 2, No. 9. Source pages: 10.
Student Focus Shane Lowery Graduate Assistant Dr. Joe McGahan ULM, Social Science Research Lab 2010-2011 4th Judicial District Court Caseflow Assessment Project
In 2010, Shane Lowery, graduate student working through the Social Science Research Lab at University of Louisiana Monroe, began his work for the 4th Judicial District Court of Louisiana. Shane has worked to develop an assessment that would measure the current caseflow practices in the court system. He explained to the Times, “The local administrators were interested in knowing how long it was taking to process their cases from the time of arrest to the date of disposition, and how they matched up with national standards.” Shane collects data on “case time” and also gathers information on variables that could have an effect on overall caseflow time, including the number of pretrial resets, inactive or loss time due to failure of individuals to appear, and trial resets. “As word of this project spread,” Shane explained, “the Louisiana Supreme Court became interested and helped me in the development of the assessment, with the overall goal of developing a system that can be used in any district court across the state.” The project stemmed from a MacArthur Foundation Grant titled the Louisiana Models for Change Initiative, received by Dr. Jana Sutton of ULM's Marriage and Family Therapy Program. This effort aimed to increase evidence-based practices within the 4th Judicial District Court's Juvenile Justice System. Representing the Social Science Research Lab, Dr. Joe McGahan and Shane were contracted to manage data collection and analysis, putting them in contact with Juvenile Court Judge Sharon Marchman, and leading to the caseflow project. Shane is interested in Industrial- Organizational Psychology and said, “This project was of special interest to me. The thought of doing an efficiency analysis of our local court was intriguing and would give me a chance to really explore an area of I/O psychology that I found interesting.”
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