Program Funding

📝 Call for Manuscripts: Exploring the Role of Higher Education in Prison and Returning People on Campuses and Communities from the Coalition of Urban and Metropolitan Universities.

📚 This call for complete, full manuscripts is open to all authors who are engaged in the scholarly exploration of programs, initiatives, and/or research centers that implement support for returning community members or facilitate higher education in prison and its impact on campuses and communities.

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The U.S. Department of Labor will be granting $52 million to support projects that advance pre-release job training and apprenticeship programs for incarcerated individuals.

These Pathway Home grants will be awarded to projects that provide incarcerated individuals with legal assistance, counseling, job search strategies and other foundational skills prior to release. These grants—ranging from $1 million to $4 million to each recipient—demonstrate the value of initiatives like Education in Action that close the gaps between higher education in prison and employment opportunities.…

In this news article from Open Campus, four formerly incarcerated people share their experiences with Pell Grants prior to 1994—when Congress eliminated access to federal financial aid for incarcerated students. Their stories have been edited for length and clarity.

The information provided here from Jobs for the Future (JFF) is a snapshot of factors to consider when offering programs to students who are incarcerated and who are not eligible for Pell Grants. Universities and colleges are individually operated, and not all strategies are equally applicable.

This resource from Jobs for the Future (JFF) is designed to help prison education programs, correctional agencies, and financial aid departments establish the critical partnerships necessary to effectively administer the Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA) to incarcerated students. Keep in mind that the details may vary depending on state and local context.

This resource from Jobs for the Future (JFF) can help postsecondary institutions capitalize on existing national data sources to obtain information on prison education programs and students.

In this resource, overviews for the following data sources are provided:

  • Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System (IPEDS)
  • Federal Student Aid (FSA) data
  • Program for the International Assessment of Adult Competencies (PIAAC) Survey of Incarcerated Adults
  • Education Justice Tracker (EJT)
  • National Student Clearinghouse (NSC)
  • National Directory…

This brief from the National Skills Coalition proposes a new $500 million Career Pathways Support Fund that would allow community and technical colleges to provide critical academic, counseling, and support services that help low-income and other nontraditional students succeed in job-driven education programs. The report highlights promising practices in career development from three states that are tackling these issues head-on, including the Career Pathways Initiative in Arkansas, the Pathways for Academic Career and Employment (PACE) program in Iowa, and the Basic Skills Plus program…

The Second Chance Pell Experimental Sites Initiative, launched by the U.S. Department of Education in 2015, provides need-based Pell Grants to people in state and federal prisons. Second Chance Pell has active partnerships with 64 colleges that teach in 28 states. The schools were selected in June 2016 for the initiative, which examines whether expanding access to financial aid increases incarcerated adults’ partici­pation in educational opportunities. The Vera Institute of Justice (Vera) is providing technical assistance to the participating colleges and corrections departments, helping…

Access to education is in high demand among the incarcerated population. There are clear benefits to students who are incarcerated, their families and communities, public safety, and safety inside prisons. Yet the gap in educational aspirations and participation has been largely driven by a lack of capacity due to limited funding.

The Manhattan District Attorney’s Criminal Justice Investment Initiative funded the College-in-Prison Reentry Initiative (CIP) to close this gap by expanding access to college education in prisons throughout New York State. This fact sheet unpacks the…

Access to education is in high demand among the incarcerated population. There are clear benefits to students who are incarcerated, their families and communities, public safety, and safety inside prisons. Yet the gap in educational aspirations and participation has been largely driven by a lack of capacity due to limited funding.

The Manhattan District Attorney’s Criminal Justice Investment Initiative funded the College-in-Prison Reentry Initiative (CIP) to close this gap by expanding access to college education in prisons throughout New York State. In this report, Vera Institute of…