Research

This report from Ithaka S+R summarizes the results of a scan of media review directives from all 50 states and the District of Columbia for their respective state departments of corrections.

Ithaka S+R’s letter to the Department of Education outlines their concerns and provides recommendations that would help ensure that people who are incarcerated in the United States are provided the opportunity to participate in and benefit from a quality education.

In 2022, Ithaka S+R launched a nationwide survey that would help determine the national landscape for access to educational technology in prison education programs. The survey asked respondents about student access to technology in their higher education in prison program, collecting demographic information before focusing on four thematic areas: technological devices, learning management systems and software, network connection and internet access, and future technology plans. The findings from this survey are presented in this report.

The Rise Up Conference seeks to liberate higher education during and after prison. It highlights the role of incarcerated and formerly incarcerated people in birthing this movement, the ways in which these spaces have been occupied by others, the assets we offer to these spaces, and the ways in which allies can help foster liberation. The conference also provides perspectives on higher education during and after prison that are unique to those with lived expertise.

In an effort to make visible the national landscape of access to educational technology in prison education programs, Ithaka S+R launched a first-of-its-kind national survey in the fall of 2022, with grant funding support from Ascendium Education Group. The survey asked respondents about student access to technology in their higher education in prison program, collecting demographic information before focusing on four thematic areas: technological devices, learning management systems and software, network connection and internet access, and future technology plans. In the wake of this…

This is a research brief describing the impact of effective education programs on people who are/have been incarcerated.

This report provides a broad perspective on the U.S. prison population and takes a look at the status of prison education programs.

This research article summarizes the results of a series of studies conducted by the Texas Criminal Justice Policy Council to evaluate the ability of the Texas prison educational system to improve the educational level of inmates, enhance their employment prospects, and lower their recidivism rates.

The Three-State Recidivism Study reviews one of the major functions of the criminal justice system, that is, to rehabilitate. Over the past decade, greater emphasis has been placed on the other major rationales, specifically incarceration and punishment, without much commitment to rehabilitation. The result of the push to incarcerate and punish that occurred in the 1990s and early 2000s is an unprecedented growth in the
size of the nation’s prison and jail populations, even as crime rates have decreased. Given the economic hardship of maintaining federal, state, and local…

This report provides an introduction to services and programs available within California by collecting descriptive information about each. These programs do not necessarily represent a catalog of best practices or model programs that have been proven to be effective. Rather, this report is a starting block from which to build that analysis, and the authors suggest that as the next important stage in related research.