The Criminal Justice Hub represents a creative and collaborative network managed by Criminologists in the Social Sciences Directorate of the School of Nursing, Midwifery, Social Work and Social Sciences. Primarily it allows researchers who are interested in the broad field of criminal justice to exchange ideas, work collaboratively and publicise their research to fellow academics and practitioners or policy makers . Current members represent a wide range of disciplines including, but not limited to, criminology, sociology, social policy, social work, psychology, health, computer sciences, arts and media, nursing and law.
History and Formation of the Criminal Justice Hub:
The birth of the Criminal Justice Hub lies with the legacy of the former Salford Centre for Prison Studies which had been convened by Dr Elaine Crawley for many years, initially in the School of English, Politics & Contemporary History. Following the retirement of Dr Crawley and membership of a new School a number of criminologists in the social sciences directorate began discussing the need to both continue the work of the prison’s centre but also to broaden its appeal.
In summer 2015 Dr Muzammil Quraishi and Dr Toni Wood secured a social enterprise grant to firstly conduct a mapping exercise across the University to identify academics working broadly in the field of criminal justice and secondly to create a Criminal Justice Hub as a permanent network to enable researchers and practitioners to explore research and enterprise collaboration. Dr Toni Wood was appointed as the coordinator for the CJ Hub project and has continued to develop the Hub with team members within the social sciences directorate.
On 9 Dec 2015, Muzammil Quraishi convened a workshop with over 30 interested parties to discuss their respective research and potential future collaboration. A key series of priorities emerged from that meeting which are summarised below:
The Criminal Justice Hub now has over 50 members and has enabled members to begin working on collaborative research bids, academic writing and planning for future CPD work.