PERU has earned a strong reputation throughout the criminal justice system (CJS) for partnering with key organisations and developing groundbreaking rehabilitative strategies and interventions geared towards reducing reoffending and the effective and humane management of people with convictions.  

In 2019, PERU was commissioned by the HM Inspectorate of Probation to undertake a Rapid Evidence Assessment (REA) of the effectiveness of remote supervision approaches and emerging technologies for the management and rehabilitation of probation service users. The evaluation proved pivotal insofar as PERU cautioned against employing technological interventions without first establishing a clearer evidence base, paving the way for further empirical research to inform public sector reform.

Between 2012 and 2020, PERU worked with the Community Rehabilitation Company (CRC) Interserve in order to evaluate new models of managing people with convictions. This partnership led to the groundbreaking development of the assessment tool Enablers of Change. The tool is designed to assess the risks, needs, strengths and protective factors of adults with convictions. A formative evaluation by PERU highlighted its potentially revolutionary applications in probation, whilst further analysis magnified the potentially international significance of an assessment tool that captures crucial information about people with convictions that is otherwise neglected. As a result of this work, since 2022 PERU has been a member of Her Majesty’s Prison and Probation Service reference group advising on the development of a new assessment system to replace OASys.

PERU positions itself at the forefront of rehabilitative policy research with cutting-edge approaches to tackling pressing issues in the delivery of criminal justice. In 2021, PERU teamed with Queen’s University Belfast to investigate the provocative issue of the use of Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT) in the CJS. The study addresses controversies surrounding the use of CBT in the CJS, such as how its practice focuses only narrowly on criminogenic factors, and considers the policy implications.

PERU also hosts, manages and publishes the British Journal of Community Justice (BJCJ). The BJCJ is a vehicle for advancing the community and criminal justice evidence base both nationally and internationally.  

PERU has partnered with a range of key stakeholders across the criminal justice system (CJS) in order to produce evidence-based approaches and interventions that target the needs of vulnerable and hard to reach groups, including women with convictions. 

In 2018, PERU undertook an impact evaluation of the support services provided by the Greater Manchester Women’s Support Alliance (GMWSA). The GMWSA aims to reduce the number of custodial sentences amongst women involved in the CJS, championing preventative measures and alternatives to incarceration. PERU’s evaluation foregrounded the lived experiences of the women accessing these services, and included a reconviction study using Police National Computer (PNC) data in order to explore the longitudinal benefits of the GMWSA. 

Starting from 2015 and extending into 2022, PERU has played an instrumental role in the evaluation and development of the Whole Systems Approach (WSA) towards managing women with convictions. The WSA is a holistic approach that aims to assess women’s needs at first point of contact with the CJS and throughout their journey through the system. PERU conducted a process, impact and economic analysis of the Greater Manchester WSA, culminating in a final evaluation report published in May 2018. PERU’s research contributed significantly to the evidence base surrounding the WSA, and has since been embraced by the Ministry of Justice (MoJ) in support of public service reform.

Building on the Greater Manchester WSA evaluation, in 2021 PERU teamed with the London Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime (MOPAC) in order to investigate the experiences of women accessing WSA services provided by Advance and Women in Prison. This project further expands PERU’s ambition to generate timely, evidence-based research to inform policy surrounding women who come into contact with the CJS.

PERU works across the criminal justice system (CJS) with a variety of policy makers and stakeholders in order to improve rehabilitative strategies and enhance efforts to reduce reoffending. Central to this endeavour is work on youth diversion. 

In 2017, PERU undertook a process evaluation of the Transition to Adulthood (T2A) Pathway initiative. The programme, funded by the Barrow Cadbury Trust, works with young adults at different stages of the CJS process in an effort to reduce offending and breach rates and produce improved social outcomes for stakeholders. PERU’s final process evaluation report helped to highlight the factors that led to young adults involved in T2A coming into contact with the CJS, and made a significant contribution to the evidence base that has led to real world change.  

In 2019, PERU joined the Evaluation Panel of the Youth Endowment Fund (YEF). Since then, PERU has worked with the YEF alongside the Manchester Centre for Youth Studies (MCYS) on a variety of projects including four youth diversion project evaluations. This, alongside ongoing collaborative relationships with other What Works Network centres such as the Centre for Homelessness Impact, establishes PERU as a major contributor to the What Works agenda. 

PERU strives to produce pioneering, timely research that targets issues of international significance. Highlights include a 2020 study linking the use of theoretical principles drawn from information science research to the improvement of educational preventing violent extremism (EPVE) programmes for young people. The study offers a groundbreaking perspective that strengthens the evidence-base for counter-radicalisation policy in the UK and worldwide.

In 2020, the Greater Manchester Combined Authority (GMCA) commissioned the Crime & Well-Being Big Data Centre (BDC) to become its research and evaluation partner. Since this time, the BDC, now fully integrated into the Policy Evaluation & Research Unit , has undertaken a range of projects centred on assessing the nature and extent of violence, its causes and consequences in the Greater Manchester region. It has also undertaken numerous evaluations of interventions, launched by the Violence Reduction Unit (VRU) to prevent violent crime.

These research and evaluation activities have included:

The development of dynamic violent crime profiles for the VRU and its partners.

Rapid Evidence Assessments designed to inform the development of violence prevention activities.

National and international comparisons of the trends in, and drivers of violent crime.

Logic modelling of the VRU and of partner / individual interventions.

The development of tools to shape risk prioritisation and resource allocation.

The design and implementation of the evaluation of the VRU and its interventions (e.g., The hospital-based Navigators programme, The Prosecution, Intervention, Education and Diversion pilot programme).

The delivery of research outputs to meet the needs of the VRU, its partners and communities in Greater Manchester.

PERU undertakes rigorous evaluations of educational interventions, to determine their impact and to understand what works. As an independent evaluator for the Education Endowment Foundation (EEF) and other ‘What Works Centres’, we design and implement robust Randomised Controlled Trials, other types of counterfactual impact evaluation and impact feasibility studies and implementation evaluations.

PERU was involved in the study of early education and development (SEED) in England, funded by the Department for Education. The project was undertaken in partnership with NatCen Social Research, the University of Oxford, Action for Children and Frontier Economics. Findings are referenced in the book ‘Early Learning and Child Well-being in England’ and by the Professional Association for Childcare and Early Years (PACEY) in a submission to the Education Commission inquiry on life chances.

PERU has also been involved in a number of projects funded by the Education Endowment Fund (EEF). We evaluated the effectiveness of the Eedi formative assessment programme (an online assessment tool that helps maths teachers to identify and address pupil misconceptions) on raising attainment in maths. This was publicised in a news article by EEF. The Family Skills evaluation was also publicised in a news article, and also highlighted by Learning Unlimited, the organisation who led the Family Skills project. A further project funded by the EEF was the Digital Technology Evidence Review, in which PERU and ESRI were commissioned to review the evidence for the impact of digital technologies on attainment in schools. Not only has this had an academic impact (the review has been cited in multiple academic publications), it has been referenced in various blogs, including those by the CLC, Ability2Access and Third Space Learning. Moreover, a webinar by Derby Research School discussed the guidance report; the report was referenced in Planning for Digital Technology in Education by the Windsor Academy Trust; recommendations from the report were shared on X by the EEF. This report has had a further impact in schools, where it has been used in strategy reports (for instance, Holy Cross Catholic Primary School in The Wirral).

More recently, PERU and AlphaPlus (funded by the EEF) published the Deeper Thinking pilot report, and a project exploring the effects of using examination grade as a primary outcome in education trials to evaluate school-based interventions has been completed this year. PERU is currently involved in additional projects, including evaluating the effectiveness of the SEND Review process on raising attainment in English, and secondary outcomes, and a PALs trial.