Walter Fortson never expected to finish college, especially as inmate 819161D at the Mountainview Youth Correctional Facility, in Hunterdon County, N.J. A few years ago, he chose to be a crack dealer to support his family and his reckless spending habits. He thought he was too smart to get caught, until one day in 2008 when he made a bad move. He…

The Princeton Teaching Initiative at Princeton University is an all-volunteer group formed to teach for-credit college courses in the New Jersey state prison system. The courses are coordinated with the Mercer County Community College (MCCC), which accredits the courses and maintains the students' transcripts. Volunteer professors, postdoctoral…

Over the past several years practitioners in the field of Criminal Justice have begun to reaffirm, recognize, and implement the tenets of the rehabilitative ideal within their daily operations. However, despite scholarly research showing that offender rehabilitation can have marked positive affects upon recidivism, many practitioners remain…

A program initiated by Mercer County Community College (New Jersey) to educate prisoners via a multi-media, individualized, self-paced network is described along with suggestions for future development. (NF)

Most state inmates incarcerated under the jurisdiction of the New Jersey Department of Corrections are driven to crimes by drug abuse. Understanding the factors contributing to addiction is the first step in developing strategies for successful inmate reintegration. This study presents an analysis of inmate addiction and factor association using…

The ability of inmates to secure stable, legal employment for themselves upon release from prison has been shown to be a crucial element for successful community reintegration. These individuals, however, often fail to find employment due to a multitude of personal, relational, structural, and institutional barriers. Formerly incarcerated women…

The rising number of individuals returning to communities from prison and jail represents one of the defining issues of time. Individuals reentering society face myriad challenges, not the least of which is securing viable employment; in addition, each individual has a unique set of experiences, needs and resources. This project stems from the…

The problem of the increasing crime rate in the United States and the social problems causing and resulting from this increase as well as the correct way to treat criminals are discussed. The point is made that the cost of vocational training for inmates is far below the cost of imprisoning chronic offenders. In this report, the vocational…

In the past decade, the most important technological innovation in higher education has been the enhancement of academic courses with Web-based information and tools. Given the success and popularity of numerous Web-based innovations, the author and two colleagues wondered whether the benefits of technology use could be scaled up from the course…

This report describes the disproportionate incarceration of minority youth in the state of New Jersey. It opens with an introduction followed by a section, "Problem Statement," which describes the plight of New Jersey's Black and Hispanic children, research in this area, recent historical trends, state and community programs, and the…

In New Jersey, the corrections system has grown from approximately 6,000 offenders in 1975 to more than 25,000 offenders and more than 19,000 parolees currently. An estimated 70 percent of the incarcerated perform at the two lowest literacy levels. Of the approximately $25,000 spent per offender for each year of incarceration, only 1-2.5 percent…