A composer and project leader tracks the connections between the needs of incarcerated students and a successful music-making studio program design. Central to the work, and applicable to any art form or educational setting, is the informed predicting of students' potentials and the communities transformation of the meeting place--in this case, a…

Explosions in America's incarceration rates have sparked critical examinations of root causes of entry into the criminal justice system. Researchers have predominantly focused on what is known as the school-to-prison pipeline. Solutions have centered on revising school policies and practices targeting certain students for disciplinary sanctions…

Individuals with barriers to employment such as people with disabilities or people who transition from prison to the community face different challenges in navigating the world of work. Participants in this study were incarcerated males (n = 87) who completed the Career Thoughts Inventory (CTI) and the Self-Directed Search (SDS), in addition to…

In Maine, where black people are a mere 1.6% of the population today, there once existed a small mixed-race community called Malaga Island. In 1912, the state forcibly evicted Malaga's residents and committed eight to the Maine School for the Feebleminded. The state and the press branded this cruel tragedy a triumph and their interpretation was…

Objective: This study assessed the effectiveness of Seeking Safety on depression and post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) with incarcerated women. Method: A randomized controlled trial (N = 40) was used to analyze Seeking Safety's effectiveness compared to a treatment-as-usual control group. Analyses of covariance were used to assess differences…

This qualitative study explored three learning outcomes--critical and creative thinking, ethical reasoning and action, and civic knowledge and engagement--to assess the impact of a liberal education on formerly incarcerated men. Three questions guided this study: 1) How do former inmates describe their postsecondary liberal educational experiences…

New York State has long been a leader in education, both higher education and general education in prison, dating back to the 1800s. Following reforms implemented during the administration of Governor Franklin Roosevelt, New York State was later recognized as having the best prison education system in the country (Gehring 1997). At the heyday of…

This study used qualitative data to analyze how fathers in a rural Pennsylvania prison were involved in their children's literacy, learning, and education before and during incarceration and through the Read to Your Child/Grandchild (RYCG) program. Before RYCG, most fathers took steps such as reading to children, teaching reading and math,…

In an effort to humanize the issues surrounding mass incarceration, and to foster empathy in historic site visitors, Eastern State Penitentiary Historic Site launched a pilot tour program that hired formerly incarcerated people to give tours of the building. These 15-minute tours allowed visitors to hear personal stories of incarceration alongside…

Prison education is seen in both criminal and education policies as a way of assimilating inmates 'back into society'. In spite of the policy emphasis on education, the practices in prison education vary from prison to prison. The stated aim of prison education in EU and in Finnish national level policies is to teach inmates the skills and…

Prisons across the United States of America are faced with finding ways to reduce illiteracy rates across adult education. One strategy is to offer reading programs that are based on the science of reading. Thus, the purpose of this study was to determine if adults in treatment groups across five midwestern correctional institutions who received a…

This paper articulates the first 'general theory' of prison education, offering a new insight into the relevance of desistance theory and understanding of prison sociology to the lives of men engaged in education whilst in prison. Using a realist review method (Pawson, 2002b; Wong, 2013a) we develop a rough, initial general theory of prison…

This paper explores the reformulation of the English curriculum for prison education across England and Wales in the second decade of the twenty-first century. As a PhD researcher and Functional English teacher examining the use of drama and creative education in a prison at the time, a prohibition on the use of fictional reading and writing…

The relationship between autism, criminality and psychopathy has gained increased attention in recent years, although research has focused on autism spectrum disorders, and not autistic traits. We measured autistic traits (with the Autism Spectrum Quotient) in a sample of 101 inmates from a high-security prison and compared them to a control…

Violent extremism research is still lacking a sound empirical basis for the validation of assessment instruments. Yet there is a growing need for these instruments to assess the dangerousness of individuals, but also the success of interventions. By analysing prisoner files of one female and 39 male inmates (average age 28.83 years, SD = 7.58)…