In one course reading, students examine a Norwegian prison cell with a window overlooking trees, movable furniture and a bathroom door that closes.

In Drexel Kline’s Comparative Penal Reform course, those details become part of a broader question: What does a correctional system prioritize?

Students study correctional systems in the United States and Scandinavia through readings, site visits and comparative analysis, examining how ideas about dignity and security become visible in practice.

For Lauren Katz Smith, associate professor of law and director of the Community Lawyering Clinic, who teaches the course alongside Jordan Hyatt, professor of criminology and justice studies and affiliated faculty member at Drexel’s Kline School of Law, the goal is not to decide which system is “better.” It’s to understand what different systems prioritize and how those priorities become visible in practice.

First Impressions

The course begins with theory.

Students study the history and philosophy behind Scandinavian incarceration models, including concepts such as dignity, normality and rehabilitation. They also examine critiques of those systems alongside scholarship about the American criminal legal system.

Earlier this spring, students visited SCI Chester, including Little Scandinavia, a housing unit informed by Scandinavian correctional principles.

For some students, the experience disrupted assumptions almost immediately.

“When I first entered SCI Chester, I was ironically unsurprised by the prison’s layout and physical structure,” said Jarred Rosar, JD ’27. Rosar also pointed to aspects of the facility that complicated his expectations, including trade-skills programs and the more personalized living spaces within Little Scandinavia.

“When students encounter systems that challenge what they assumed was normal or inevitable, it creates space for deeper reflection,” Katz Smith said.

Students are encouraged to examine not only what they observe, but also why certain reactions emerge in the first place.

“A lot of students come in thinking either, ‘Scandinavia has completely figured this out,’ or ‘nothing they do there could ever work in the United States,’” Katz Smith said. “What we try to do is move beyond those extremes and think more critically about what different systems prioritize and why, and what we can learn from that comparison.”

What Design Reveals

Some of the course’s most revealing comparisons emerge through ordinary details.

Prison cells in Norway and the United States become points of comparison throughout the course, particularly in discussions about architecture, materials and spatial design.

For Natalie Webb, JD ’27, one image from an early reading stayed with her throughout the semester. “We examined the design of a cell in a Norwegian prison, and I was especially struck by the window pictured in the article,” she said.

The window overlooked trees and natural surroundings, a design choice intended to preserve a sense of normality and connection to the outside world. “That detail mattered to me because it symbolized a very different philosophy of punishment,” Webb said. “It captured how architecture itself can communicate dignity, hope, or exclusion.”

Katz Smith said differences in prison design often reflect different institutional values around privacy, security and supervision. In many American correctional settings, furniture is fixed in place for security purposes, toilets remain visible from outside the cell and surveillance shapes much of the environment. Architecture is only part of the comparison.

In Scandinavian prisons, correctional staff often serve in mentorship-oriented roles focused on reintegration and relationship building. In the United States, staffing structures tend to prioritize surveillance and security.

Hyatt said students are often surprised by how closely justice systems mirror broader social and political values.

“Students often expect to focus solely on prisons and policy, but what may surprise them is how much history, culture, and politics are intertwined,” he said. “They realize justice systems aren’t simply technical structures; they’re reflections of a society’s values.”

“The most fundamental difference lies in their core philosophy,” Webb said. “The U.S. system is built on retribution and deterrence, while the Scandinavian model is rooted in rehabilitation and the ‘normality principle.’”

Where Law Becomes Visible

The course’s comparative framework becomes most tangible during its week-long travel component across Sweden, Denmark and Norway, where students move through correctional institutions, legal spaces and community-based organizations that ground the semester’s theoretical readings in practice.

In Sweden, students visit youth detention facilities and meet with agency leadership involved in juvenile justice policy, examining systems that blend supervision with education and rehabilitation. In Denmark, students engage with organizations focused on street law and harm reduction, broadening discussions about legal intervention beyond formal institutions. In Norway, the course includes visits to courts, correctional institutions and reintegration programs, along with conversations with legal professionals, academics and law students.

For Katz Smith, the Comparative Penal Reform course is less about arriving at clean conclusions than learning how to sit with complexity.

“Prison is still prison, no matter where you go,” she said.