Our Approach

Rapid Employment and Development Initiative (READI) Chicago

Project

Rapid Employment and Development Initiative (READI) Chicago

READI Chicago is a gun violence reduction initiative that provides almost two years of intensive programming to men at the highest risk of shooting or being shot.

Jan 2017 Community Violence Intervention

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The Crime Lab designs, tests, and scales data-driven innovations to improve the public sector’s response to the dual challenges of America’s gun violence crisis and a criminal justice system that is not truly just. Below find broad categories of our work.

Topics

Community Violence Intervention

Community Violence Intervention

Through a combination of street outreach by credible messengers and behavioral science-informed interventions, community violence intervention (CVI) programs help de-escalate stressful situations before they lead to violence.

Criminal Justice Reform

Criminal Justice Reform

We’re advancing long overdue reforms to reduce the harms of America’s broken criminal justice system.

Gun Violence

Gun Violence

In cities across America, communities face high rates of gun violence and significant harm caused by the criminal justice system – both of which disproportionately impact communities of color.

Policing

Policing

If we want to address America’s gun violence epidemic and save lives today, fair and effective policing is essential. But for too many communities, we are failing to deliver that kind of policing.

Youth Violence

Youth Violence

Gun violence is the leading cause of death for young people in America. But youth violence interventions can help keep kids safe and reach those who are the hardest to reach.

Methodologies

Behavioral Science

Behavioral Science

By learning more about human decision-making in stressful situations, behavioral science can help us identify better ways to deal with the harms created by gun violence and a broken criminal justice system — and can help prevent these harms before they occur.

Machine Learning

Machine Learning

Machine learning tools continually leverage data to “learn” and improve performance — whether that’s cleaning datasets or analyzing the data within them to make recommendations.

Policy and Program Evaluation

Policy and Program Evaluation

We work with government agencies and community-based partners to rigorously evaluate gun violence intervention programs and criminal justice policy reforms.

Randomized Controlled Trials

Randomized Controlled Trials

Randomized controlled trials are the gold standard in research, producing causal evidence about the efficacy and impact of policies and programs.

Explore more of our work

Learn more about all of our projects at the Crime Lab.

Community Safety Leadership Academies
Project

Community Safety Leadership Academies

The Community Safety Leadership Academies, composed of the Policing Leadership Academy and Community Violence Intervention Leadership Academy, aim to educate police and community violence intervention leaders.

Situational Decision-Making (Sit-D)
Project

Situational Decision-Making (Sit-D)

The Crime Lab and the Chicago Police Department (CPD) partnered to create and evaluate a behavioral science-informed training that helps improve officer decision-making in ambiguous, high-stress situations.

CVI Leadership Academy
CURRENT

CVI Leadership Academy

The Community Violence Intervention Leadership Academy (CVILA) was established to develop the CVI sector by providing aspiring CVI leaders with the skills necessary to tackle leadership obstacles throughout their careers.

Video about the Narcotics Arrest Diversion Program
Video

Video about the Narcotics Arrest Diversion Program

Jun 2023

This video provides an overview of the Crime Lab’s evaluation of the Narcotics Arrest Diversion Program, a program implemented by the community behavioral health provider Thresholds.

Violence Reduction Dashboard

Violence Reduction Dashboard

The Violence Reduction Dashboard (VRD) is a publicly available visualization and analysis tool that provides greater transparency and accessibility to near-real-time violent crime data in the city of Chicago.

Community Violence Intervention (CVI) Leadership Academy Spotlight
Video

Community Violence Intervention (CVI) Leadership Academy Spotlight

Nov 2023

Watch violence prevention experts speak to the significance of our CVI Leadership Academy in this short video.