Correctional Facility Time and Motion Study

Author

Christopher EganFollow
Ty Shadix, Kennesaw State UniversityFollow
Vanessa Mendez, Kennesaw State UniversityFollow
Rodolfo Lopez, Kennesaw State UniversityFollow

Date of Submission

Winter 12-5-2022

Project Type

Senior Design

Major

Industrial and Systems

Committee Chair/First Advisor

Dr. Khalid

Abstract

The RCVT team is a group Industrial Engineering students that chose to make an impact through a Time and Motion study at the Special Management Facility, 160 bed maximum security facility, in Georgia. The correctional facility had civil action taken against them with the plaintiffs stating that nearly all the rights they were entitled to through the correctional facility had been violated. Their services consist of their out of cell time, library, book carts, programming, privileges, and mealtimes. Missing delivery of these services resulted in a violation of the offender’s 8^th Amendment right to no cruel or unusual punishment.

Kennesaw State University was approached after civil action was taken against the correctional facility, and the RCVT team chose to take the initiative on this project. The goal was to establish a schedule for the delivery of services to the offenders in the facility in a way that maintained the integrity of the correctional facility.

Initially research was done to better understand the facility, laws but how other Time and Motion studies have been conducted. During research it was found that in facility there were multiple safety measures in place such the grouping of offenders based on behavior for activities. It was also found that the denial of services such as three meals a day and educational activities such as programming were found to be unconstitutional and must be done daily or weekly. Finally, during research, it was concluded that the collection of accurate data for Time and Motion studies is paramount for analysis and overall success.

Early in the project, the team learned that we would not be able to visit the correctional facility for observation days but would need to contact our sight contacts for any data or insights on the facility. During these constraints, we established a line of communication with Dr. Adeel Khalid to get advice on how we should mitigate the negatives of the situation. Additionally, we set weekly meetings with correctional facility personnel to pick their brains on the schedule of the facility, understand any nuances, and gather any documentation that could help us deliver their ideal solution.

RCVT team created a dynamic schedule and simulated it using Arena. The simulation validates the schedule works and offenders are given all their basic services given the constraints that the correctional facility is subject to daily. The final steps are to implement a dynamic schedule, allocate a minimum number of officers to a wing to 8 officers per Arena results, and continue leveraging the line of communication established to fully optimize the dynamic schedule to their ideal solution.