EXPOSED
A large share of the day is documentation — presentence investigation reports, case notes, chronologies, violation reports — and actuarial risk scoring (LSI-R, COMPAS) that is already algorithmic and drafts well from structured inputs. What does not automate is the field half: home and workplace visits, drug testing, arresting or detaining violators, sitting with a defendant's family, and testifying in court. The occupation is also a state function with civil-service and often union protection, which slows headcount cuts even as per-officer caseloads absorb the productivity gain.
Mixed — a routine tier and a judgment tier. Roughly half your week — PSI narratives, chronological case notes, violation petitions, condition-compliance checklists, and the LSI-R/COMPAS scoring itself — runs off structured intake data that a model drafts competently, which pulls this well below 14; the field-contact half (unannounced home visits, observed urinalysis, hands-on searches, court testimony) is what keeps it out of the 0-6 band.
Some physical or field component. You drive to residences and job sites in neighborhoods you don't control, collect observed urine samples, sometimes carry and effect arrests on a bench warrant, and transport offenders — real uncontrolled-environment work, but it's bracketed by courthouse hearings and desk hours on the case management system, so it lands at 12 rather than the 16+ of a patrol deputy who is outdoors the entire shift.
Certification preferred, not legally required. There's no state practice licence you personally hold at risk; entry usually requires a bachelor's plus a state academy and POST-style certification, and revocation risk runs through your employing agency and civil-service discipline rather than a board that can end your career independently — certification-preferred territory, not licensed-professional immunity.
Some relationship component. The supervision relationship does real work — a probationer who talks to you about a relapse instead of absconding is a product of months of face-to-face rapport, and judges weight your PSI recommendation partly because they know you — but the relationship is court-ordered rather than chosen, caseloads of 80-150 cap how much of it you can build, and reassignment on transfer is routine, which keeps this at 12.
Exists to be accountable for ambiguous calls. You decide whether a positive test becomes a warning, a treatment referral, or a revocation petition that sends someone back to prison, and you write the sentencing recommendation the court usually follows — the override authority over the actuarial score is explicitly yours, and the consequences of getting it wrong appear in the newspaper, which is what puts this at 15 despite the structure that departmental violation matrices impose.
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