ABSTRACT
Although most Americans see corrections as correctional institutions, more individuals are under the supervision of some type of alternative to confinement than are confined. Probation, community corrections, correctional treatment, and parole serve to monitor the conduct of offenders living in the communities of our nation. At year-end 2008, there were an estimated 5,095,200 adults under supervision in the community either on probation or parole-the equivalent of about 1 out of every 45 adults in the United States. Of those under some type of noncustodial correctional sanction, approximately 4,270,917 (84%) were on probation, which has emerged as the most frequently used judicial alternative to confinement in the United States.1
