Probation Officers and Correctional Treatment Specialists
Provide social services to assist in rehabilitation of law offenders in custody or on probation or parole. Make recommendations for actions involving formulation of rehabilitation plan and treatment of offender, including conditional release and education and employment stipulations.
A wage reference for United States.
Published wage percentiles describe a distribution within the source occupation group. They provide context for a career decision; employer packages and job offers have their own terms.
This wage group may include multiple detailed occupations. The figures are for the source group, which may be broader than Probation Officers and Correctional Treatment Specialists. They are not an exact-title, employer, experience or seniority match.
May 2025 · USD · United States. Annual and hourly figures are shown only when the source publishes them; neither is calculated from the other.
U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics occupational wage data, distributed through the O*NET® OnLine service.
Annual wage thresholds
USD per year
Hourly wage thresholds
USD per hour
| Percentile | Annual wage (USD/year) | Hourly wage (USD/hour) |
|---|---|---|
| 10th | $46,840 | $22.52 |
| 25th | $54,250 | $26.08 |
| 50th · Median | $66,270 | $31.86 |
| 75th | $84,780 | $40.76 |
| 90th | $107,790 | $51.82 |
“≥” means at least the published amount; “≤” means at most that amount. These are bounds, not exact values. “Not published” means the source did not provide that figure. Occupational wages follow the source definition and do not establish an employer’s base salary, equity or total compensation.
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What this career involves.
Occupation definitions describe common work. Responsibilities and requirements vary by employer and specific job.
Selected title examples
Expand more title examples (43)
Typical tasks
- Prepare and maintain case folder for each assigned inmate or offender.
- Gather information about offenders' backgrounds by talking to offenders, their families and friends, and other people who have relevant information.
- Interview probationers and parolees regularly to evaluate their progress in accomplishing goals and maintaining the terms specified in their probation contracts and rehabilitation plans.
- Discuss with offenders how such issues as drug and alcohol abuse and anger management problems might have played roles in their criminal behavior.
- Supervise people on community-based sentences, such as electronically monitored home detention, and provide field supervision of probationers by conducting curfew checks or visits to home, work, or school.
- Investigate alleged parole violations, using interviews, surveillance, and search and seizure.
Expand more tasks (15)
- Recommend remedial action or initiate court action in response to noncompliance with terms of probation or parole.
- Arrange for medical, mental health, or substance abuse treatment services according to individual needs or court orders.
- Develop liaisons and networks with other parole officers, community agencies, correctional institutions, psychiatric facilities, and aftercare agencies to plan for helping offenders with life adjustments.
- Administer drug and alcohol tests, including random drug screens of offenders, to verify compliance with substance abuse treatment programs.
- Inform offenders or inmates of requirements of conditional release, such as office visits, restitution payments, or educational and employment stipulations.
- Participate in decisions about whether cases should go before courts and which court should hear them.
- Write reports describing offenders' progress.
- Conduct prehearing and presentencing investigations and testify in court regarding offenders' backgrounds and recommended sentences and sentencing conditions.
- Arrange for postrelease services, such as employment, housing, counseling, education, and social activities.
- Provide offenders or inmates with assistance in matters concerning detainers, sentences in other jurisdictions, writs, and applications for social assistance.
- Develop and prepare packets containing information about social service agencies, assistance organizations, and programs that might be useful for inmates or offenders.
- Develop rehabilitation programs for assigned offenders or inmates, establishing rules of conduct, goals, and objectives.
- Recommend appropriate penitentiary for initial placement of an offender.
- Assess the suitability of penitentiary inmates for release under parole and statutory release programs and submit recommendations to parole boards.
- Identify and approve work placements for offenders with community service sentences.
Skills used in this work
- Active Listening
- Giving full attention to what other people are saying, taking time to understand the points being made, asking questions as appropriate, and not interrupting at inappropriate times.
- Social Perceptiveness
- Being aware of others' reactions and understanding why they react as they do.
- Speaking
- Talking to others to convey information effectively.
- Critical Thinking
- Using logic and reasoning to identify the strengths and weaknesses of alternative solutions, conclusions, or approaches to problems.
- Reading Comprehension
- Understanding written sentences and paragraphs in work-related documents.
- Complex Problem Solving
- Identifying complex problems and reviewing related information to develop and evaluate options and implement solutions.
Expand more skills (29)
- Monitoring
- Monitoring/Assessing performance of yourself, other individuals, or organizations to make improvements or take corrective action.
- Writing
- Communicating effectively in writing as appropriate for the needs of the audience.
- Judgment and Decision Making
- Considering the relative costs and benefits of potential actions to choose the most appropriate one.
- Active Learning
- Understanding the implications of new information for both current and future problem-solving and decision-making.
- Time Management
- Managing one's own time and the time of others.
- Coordination
- Adjusting actions in relation to others' actions.
- Negotiation
- Bringing others together and trying to reconcile differences.
- Persuasion
- Persuading others to change their minds or behavior.
- Instructing
- Teaching others how to do something.
- Service Orientation
- Actively looking for ways to help people.
- Systems Analysis
- Determining how a system should work and how changes in conditions, operations, and the environment will affect outcomes.
- Systems Evaluation
- Identifying measures or indicators of system performance and the actions needed to improve or correct performance, relative to the goals of the system.
- Learning Strategies
- Selecting and using training/instructional methods and procedures appropriate for the situation when learning or teaching new things.
- Management of Personnel Resources
- Motivating, developing, and directing people as they work, identifying the best people for the job.
- Operations Monitoring
- Watching gauges, dials, or other indicators to make sure a machine is working properly.
- Operation and Control
- Controlling operations of equipment or systems.
- Quality Control Analysis
- Conducting tests and inspections of products, services, or processes to evaluate quality or performance.
- Mathematics
- Using mathematics to solve problems.
- Operations Analysis
- Analyzing needs and product requirements to create a design.
- Science
- Using scientific rules and methods to solve problems.
- Management of Financial Resources
- Determining how money will be spent to get the work done, and accounting for these expenditures.
- Management of Material Resources
- Obtaining and seeing to the appropriate use of equipment, facilities, and materials needed to do certain work.
- Programming
- Writing computer programs for various purposes.
- Troubleshooting
- Determining causes of operating errors and deciding what to do about it.
- Technology Design
- Generating or adapting equipment and technology to serve user needs.
- Equipment Maintenance
- Performing routine maintenance on equipment and determining when and what kind of maintenance is needed.
- Equipment Selection
- Determining the kind of tools and equipment needed to do a job.
- Installation
- Installing equipment, machines, wiring, or programs to meet specifications.
- Repairing
- Repairing machines or systems using the needed tools.
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