The United States has the highest prison population in the world while having only 5 percent of the world’s population (Liptak, 2008). While most of the people who are incarcerated are in the prison system because of non-violent or drug related offenses. With most of these consisting of Hispanic and African American people from lower income areas. This disproportion is caused mainly because of the lack of equal access to education. Four in every ten prisoners returns to jail within three years of being released “a collective rate that has remained largely unchanged in years, despite huge increases in prison spending,” (Johnson, 2011). This paper will look at how the access to education helps to prevent recidivism as well as people resorting to crime in the first place.
In 2016 there are more than 2.3 million people who are incarcerated in the United States criminal justice system (Wagner and Rubuy, 2016). According to statistics more than 636,000 people leave prison each year, while people enter jail more than 11 million times a year (Wagner and Rubuy, 2016). This is mostly because the people in jail have not been convicted of a crime and many will be released on their own recognizance (OR) or after their bail is paid. The individuals who are unable to be released on the OR or cannot afford bail are forced to remain in jail until their trial date. So out of the high number of people who pass through the justice system only about 195,000 are actually convicted and many of these convictions are due to misdemeanors (Wagner and Rubuy, 2016).
Most of these misdemeanors result in the person serving a sentence that is less than a year. While most people who are arrested and convicted for drug offenses are locked up at the Federal level. The arrest of people on drug possession charges at the state and local level has a dire effect on people’s lives. This is because a possession charge on something as mundane as marijuana will result in a criminal record that harms the person’s future employment opportunities. This in turn forces the person to resort to criminal activities in order to survive, which in turn causes them to be incarcerated for a longer period of time when they are caught. Beside drug offenses there are nearly 7,000 juveniles that are behind bars for nothing more than the violation of their probation (Wagner and Rubuy, 2016).
In many cases probation can be violated without a person intending to do so. For example, if a person on probation happens to be in the company of a person they not aware of being on probation or parole, this can result in a violation for them and extended jail/prison time. There are 19,000 people who are locked up for issues resulting from violating immigration laws (Wagner and Rubuy). There are also an additional 33,000 immigrants, who are being detained by the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE (Wagner and Rubuy, 2016). These individuals are not charged with any crime besides being in the country illegally.
These individuals who are incarcerated for non-violent crimes, upon being released find themselves unable to obtain decent employment due to their criminal record. This is further exacerbated by the fact that many of the people who are arrested on drug, immigration and non-violent charges do not have their high school diplomas. As a general rule people who are incarcerated tend to be less educated than those who are not. Forty percent of people who are incarcerated over the age of 18 did not graduate from high school. Only fourteen percent of the general population did not graduate from high school. Nearly twenty percent of those who are incarcerated have taken and passed their high school equivalency exam. This is compared to only four percent on the general population having to rely on taking the test. Finally, only twenty-three percent of the prison population has a college degree compared with more than fifty percent of the general population (US Census Bureau, 2014). Most of the people who are in prison or jail without diploma are people of color. According to the Bureau of Statistics “27 percent of White [incarcerated people], 44 percent of Blacks, and 53 percent of Hispanics” lacked a high school education in its most recent data from 2003 (Harlow, 2003)
It is in society’s best interest to remove these disparities. Studies that have been put forward for a number of decades have revealed that the better educated a person is the less likely they are to go to prison, and if they are able to receive education while in prison they are less likely to return. This is because upon being released they are more likely to be able to earn a livable wage. This of course is also dependent on removing employer prejudices against people who have been incarcerated. In 2015 the Bureau of Labor Statistics showed that the median weekly earning of a person without a diploma was $493, while the weekly earnings for someone with a Bachelor Degree was $1137 (U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics).
Despite the obvious benefits to providing access to education in prison and to those who were formerly incarcerated there has been a number of bills passed to make it impossible for people to obtain their education while they are detained and from getting an education after they have been released. One such bill is the Omnibus Crime Bill, which contained the Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act and was passed in 1994. The bill makes it impossible for people who are or were incarcerated to receive Pell Grants. This bill has since been changed by President Obama in 2015, when executive action by his administration passed the Second Chance Pell Pilot Program. In 2005 only thirty-five percent of prisons provided their prisoners with any kind of access to education according to the Bureau of Justice Statistics (Stephan, 2008). The passing of the new bill by President Obama hopes to continue the trend in incarcerated people obtaining their GED’s in prison that has been shown to be on the rise since 2002.
In the years between 2002-2010 the number of people taking their GED in prison doubled from 5000 to 10,000 a year making a total of 75, 000 people who were incarcerated taking their GEDs in 2010. (GED, 2013). While the steps that have been taken to give prisoners access to gaining their GED’s is beneficial. The nation must also look at the reason behind why so many people of color find themselves in prison in the first place. Much of the reason for this is because children in lower income areas are not provided with enough of an incentive to remain in school. This may be due to their home life as well as the lack of proper educational tools in their school. The fact is many schools in disadvantaged neighborhoods are inundated with out of date materials, many do not have enough books for all of their students and the teachers lack the materials needed to provide their students with the best possible education.
All people should have the right to obtain access to education, rather it be inside or outside of prison. This not only decreases the chance of a person returning to prison but also helps them to be able to make enough money to be able to live comfortably, rather than having to depend on low paying jobs that leave them struggling to survive and cause them to resort back to the behavior that put them in prison in the first place.
The government should focus on putting programs in place that allow and improve the access and opportunity for young people who are struggling with their education. Rather this struggle results from them being incarcerated in either prisons or juvenile detention centers, or the lack of proper educational materials and guidance. The unequal access to education between schools in poor and wealthy neighborhoods is why standardize testing in school, especially when it comes to a student being able to graduate or attend college has such a negative impact. This is why the educational system and government must not only provide prisoners and those who have been released from prison access to educational and job training opportunities. The country also needs to improve the educational system for students obtaining their non-secondary education. One way to do this would be to get rid of or implement major changes to standardized testing. This is because standardized testing as it is currently puts students attending schools in low income areas at a disadvantage for graduation. This results in higher dropout rates and the inability for people in such areas to obtain fruitful employment. This then results in people turning to drugs and misdemeanor crime.
The biggest problem when it comes to implementing real change when it comes to the prison system and education are the politicians. Particularly the Republicans, who refuse to pass any types of reforms that would improve the United States Justice System. Their ideology is that if a person is incarcerated that they have voided their right to receive an education. They feel that education is a privilege rather than a right and if someone is arrested they have revoked that privilege. This is problematic in that the United States Justice system is set up to rehabilitate people who have committed a crime against society.
The individuals who are being denied their education due to having a criminal record are being denied their rights not only to rehabilitation but also the ability to remain outside of the prison system. According to Adam Gelb, who is the director of the Pew Project which conducted a comprehensive report on prison recidivism “national prisoner return rates are likely to remain steady unless “states more deeply embrace” programs that better prepare offenders for re-entry and reward corrections officials for finding alternatives to prison for many non-violent offenders” (Johnson, 2011). The fact is the more educated a person is the less likely they are to commit a crime. Studies have shown that a person who is able to gain access to educational programs while is prison are forty-three percent less likely to return (Keller, 2014). With the fact that ninety-three percent of the prison population will be released back into society within three years of being incarcerated. It seems that providing education for these individuals would be a benefit to society. This is because it lowers the risk of them returning to the prison system. This would result in less of the American tax dollars being spent on the prisoners. Right now the cost to house a prisoner for a year is about $55,000, while the cost of a Pell Grant is about 5,500 a year. So at ten percent of the cost of imprisonment a person can receive an education that allows them to better their lives in a way that would enable them not to feel as though they need to return to criminal activity in order to survive. Access to Pell Grants and loans would in turn open up more educational opportunities for individuals in lower economic and high crime areas. This would then bring about economic growth in these areas, which in turn would lower crime.
Besides by denying a person who is in or has been in the system the access to educational opportunities is technically punishing them twice for the same crime. The problem with the idea that education is a privilege rather than a right is that it is in direct conflict with the “Pursuit of happiness” that is promised to us as people living in the United States. This idea that education is a privilege also violates Article 26 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which states “Everyone has a right to education”. This right to education needs to extend to people who are incarcerated for sentences of five years or less.
Works Cited
GED. “GED Testing in Correctional Centers: GED Testing Service Research Studies 2011-3.” 2013. Web. 14 May 2016.
Harlow, Caroline W. "Education and Correctional Populations." U.S. Department of Justice: Bureau of Justice Statistics, Jan. 2003. Web. 14 May 2016.
Johnson, K. (2011). Study: Prisons Failing to deter Repeat Criminals in 41 States. USA Today. Web. 14 May 2016.
Keller, B. (2014). College for Criminals. The New York Times, Op-Ed. Print
Liptak, A. (2008). U.S. Prison Population Dwarfs that of Other Nations. The New York Times, America. Web. 14 May 2016
Stephan James J. “Census of State and Federal Correctional Facilities, 2005” U.S. Department of Justice, Bureau of Justice Statistics. Oct. 2008. Web. 14 May 2016.
U.S. Census Bureau. (2014). Characteristics of the group quarters population by group quarters type. 2014 American Community Survey 1-year estimates. Web. 14 May 2016.
U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. "Earnings and Unemployment Rates by Educational Attainment." United States Department of Labor, 16 Mar. 2016. Web. 14 May 2016.
Wagner, Peter, and Bernadette Rabuy. "Mass Incarceration: The Whole Pie 2016." Prison Policy Initiative. N.p., 14 Mar. 2016. Web. 14 May 2016.
