The Council of Europe presented the Prison Management Manual (the Manual), developed under the project “Support for penitentiary reform in Ukraine”, in Chernihiv, at the Chernihiv Penitentiary Academy and in Bila Tserkva, at the Penitentiary In-Service Training Centre on 10 and 11 May 2017.

The Manual provides practical and theoretical guidance in managing prisons. It aims to help senior prison staff to learn more about management methods and techniques in a prison context and to improve their practical skills in applying them for more efficient and to both to use existing resources and to achieve better results in the field of enforcement of criminal sanctions. The general outlines and the first draft of the Manual was developed by an international penitentiary consultant of the Council of Europe. The drafting work was supported by various consultations which took place with Ukrainian prison experts and representatives of the penitentiary educational institutions at several occasions. The Manual was finalized and adapted to the Ukrainian context by two national consultants.

In Chernihiv, the Director and Deputy Director of the Academy as well as lecturers and other scholars attended the presentation. In Bila Tserkva, besides the Director, Deputy Director and instructors of the In-Service Training Centre, prison directors and deputy directors of the six project pilot prisons also joined the presentation. In both days, the Council of Europe consultants gave a short overview of the Manual chapters which was followed by questions to the authors and other feedback from the audience.

The Bila Tserkva In-Service Centre has already launched a course on effective penitentiary management using the Manual.

The Manual was printed in 2 versions, a short version for practitioners’ quick reference and a longer, comprehensive version to support training and development of managerial skills. 1000 copies were distributed to the penitentiary training/educational institutions.

The Prison Management Manual was developed and published in the framework of the Project “Further Support for Penitentiary Reform in Ukraine 2015-2017”, implemented in the Partnership of the European Union and the Council of Europe for Good Governance.