Prison education
Prison education is any educational activity that occurs inside prison. Courses can include basic literacy programs, secondary school equivalency programs, vocational education and tertiary education. Other activities such as rehabilitation programs, physical education and arts and crafts programs may also be considered a form of prison education. Programs are typically provided, managed and funded by the prison system, though inmates may be required to pay for distance education programs. The history of and current practices in prison education vary greatly among countries.
Those entering prison systems worldwide have, on average, lower levels of education than the general population. Prison education often aims to make the inmate more employable by improving their skills and education. Administrating and attending educational programs in prisons can be difficult. Staff and budget shortages, a lack of educational resources and computers, and the transfer of prisoners between facilities are common barriers. Prisoners may be reluctant to participate, often due to past educational failures or a lack of motivation.
Studies consistently show that education in prison is an effective way of reducing the rates of recidivism, which saves the expense of future prison sentences. In the UK, it is estimated that every pound spent on prison education saves taxpayers more than two pounds, and in the US, the rate is four to five dollars saved for every dollar spent. Despite the known benefits of prison education programs, rates of education within prisons remain low in many countries, and attempts to increase the rate of and funding for prison education have been opposed. Opponents argue that prison education is a waste of money and that prisoners do not deserve the right to be educated. In countries where tuition is paid by students, opponents may also argue that it is unfair for prisoners to have education funding when law-abiding citizens do not.
History
Europe
Sweden is considered to be a pioneer in prison education. It became mandatory for inmates in 1842, and vocational education can be traced back to at least 1874, when the Uppsala County prison hired a carpenter to teach inmates woodworking. In Denmark, juvenile offenders have had access to education since the 1850s, and educational programs became mandatory for them in 1930. Adult prisons have had educational programs since 1866, and legislation requiring all inmates under the age of 30 to participate in educational courses was implemented in 1952. Norway opened its first prison to focus on education as a form of rehabilitation in 1851. By 1875, all eight prisons in the country were providing education to inmates, and by the end of the century, legislation was in effect ensuring that any prisoner who had not completed primary and lower secondary schooling should do so while in prison.As of 2007, every prison in Norway has a school for inmates. In Finland, legislation was adopted in 1866 which ensured that all prisoners would receive primary education, though the implementation of the order faced practical difficulties. A more successful education reform was implemented in 1899, which remained unchanged until 1975. Iceland, which as of 2011, averaged only 137 prisoners in the country, began implementing education programs in 1971. The small size of prisons in Iceland, while having many advantages, makes running organised educational programs difficult, as the small number of inmates may have drastically different educational needs.
The first significant development of prison education in England was Robert Peel's Parliamentary Gaol Act of 1823, which called for reading and writing classes in all prisons. While prison staff in the 1850s recognised the importance of basic literacy, they opposed giving prisoners any form of higher education on the grounds that education itself would not provide any "moral elevation". The Prison Act of 1877 is considered to have established the prison system that remained in effect until the 1990s, which only offered education of a "narrow and selective kind". In 1928, the majority of prisons in the UK were still only offering the most basic education courses. By 1958, while the number of educational staff in prisons had increased, there had been no other significant advancements in prison education. Education programs did not improve until 1992, when the decision was made to outsource educational instruction on a competitive basis. More than 150 organisations applied, and by 1994, there were 45 educational providers across 125 prisons, providing various forms of education including secondary and tertiary.
The Weimar Republic experimented with prison education, with a focus on developing independence and self-governance.
In 1918, the Soviet Union recommended that children in prison should receive education alongside punishment. However, few educational programs were implemented, because of the competing agendas of various jurisdictions and agencies. In the 1920s, efforts were made within the Gulag prison camps to eradicate illiteracy. Almost all the camps had classes on "political education", and some also had classes such as natural science, history of culture and foreign languages. Post-Francoist Spain saw a softening of attitudes towards prison, with the 1978 Constitution declaring that prisons should be oriented at re-education rather than forced labor. As of 1992, education was limited to basic education and some vocational training, and female inmates had less access to education than males.
North America
In the United States, prisoners were given religious instruction by chaplains in the early 19th century, and secular prison education programs were first developed in order to help inmates to read Bibles and other religious texts. The first major education program aimed at rehabilitating prisoners was launched in 1876. Zebulon Brockway, the superintendent of Elmira Reformatory in New York, is credited as being the first to implement such a program. He believed prison education would "discipline the mind and fit it to receive... the thoughts and principles that constitute their possessors good citizens". By 1900, the states of Massachusetts, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Indiana, Illinois and Minnesota had adopted the "Elmira system" of education, and by the 1930s, educational programs could be found in most prisons.Tertiary education programs did not appear until much later. In 1960, only nine states were offering college-level education to inmates; by 1983, such programs were available in most states. Between 1972 and 1995, inmates in the US were able to apply for Pell Grants, a subsidy program run by the US federal government that provides funding for students. However, in 1994 Congress passed the Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act, which denies Pell Grants to anyone who is incarcerated. As a result, by 2005 only about a dozen prisons were offering post-secondary education, compared to 350 in the early 1990s; the number in New York dropped from 70 to four. In 2015, President Barack Obama created a pilot program that allowed a limited number of inmates to receive Pell grants. More than 200 colleges in 47 states subsequently expressed interest in running educational programs for prisoners. The Trump administration considers the pilot a success, and there is bipartisan congressional support for repealing the Pell ban. The White House is also supporting a bipartisan bill for improving general education and job training in prisons, as part of broader criminal justice system reforms.
The development of prison education within Canada has paralleled that of the US. Royal Commissions in 1914 and 1936 both recommended that work programs be replaced, at least to some extent, by rehabilitative programs including education. However, education programs did not become commonplace until the mid 1940s.
A prison system in Barbados was established in 1945. Education programs were officially introduced into it in 1956, and focused on basic literacy and numeracy, though female prisoners were not allowed to participate until the prison reform Act of 1961-66 was passed. Inmates over the age of 25 were not allowed to participate in programs until 1990, when Barbados adopted the mandate of the World Conference on Education For All. The mandate also saw the offering of vocational and secondary education in the prison system.
Outside access to, and information regarding the conditions of prisons in Cuba following its political revolution in the 1950s is limited. The government permitted limited access for some journalists in 2013, but it is unclear to what extent those facilities may have been representative of the country's prisons as a whole. Private interviews were not permitted, but officials highlighted the system's work and study programs, including the teaching of skilled trades such as carpentry. According to one 1988 report by the Institute for Policy Studies, prisoners were provided with education up to a ninth grade level, inmates were provided with training in technical skills and as much as 85% of the population worked. Political reeducation also played a major role in Cuban penology.
South America
Education opportunities in prison are considered to be generally poorer in South America in comparison to the Western world. Resources for education are considered to be stretched thin across the continent due to rising incarceration rates and prison overcrowding, which are considered a by-product of the war on drugs.Prison education programs began in Argentina in the 1950s, although details about programs and their effectiveness is limited; the lack of available data is attributed to corruption within the prison system, alongside poor living conditions and high levels of violence. A law was enacted in 1996 ensuring all prisoners with less than the compulsory nine years of basic education be able to participate in educational programs. Due to administrative constraints, on average only about 25% of eligible prisoners participated in these programs as of 2010. The Dominican Republic underwent a prison reform beginning in 2003, with basic literacy becoming compulsory at nearly half the countries 35 prisons; if inmates refuse to participate they were denied privileges such as visitation. As of 2012, 36 of the 268 prisoners at Najayo women's prison were completing university degrees in either law or psychology.
As of 2009, Brazil was considered to have one of the most progressive policies on prison education in South America. In 1984, the National Congress of Brazil passed a prison reform law, recognising inmates' right to education and other services, though the law has not been effectively implemented. As of 1998, some prisons were not offering education at all, while others only had "a fraction" of inmates studying; about 23% of inmates at São Paulo State Penitentiary were enrolled in some form of education. A 2002 report by the Federal Court of Accounts estimated that over 90% of the federal budget for prisons was spent on construction of new jails, and the funding for programs including education "was not used consistent policies but rather punctual and dispersed initiatives proposed by the states". As of 2004, it is estimated that less than 20% of Brazil's 400,000 inmates had access to education.
Oceania
The first formal education program to be implemented in the Australian state of New South Wales was at Darlinghurst Gaol in 1862, when a schoolmaster was hired to provide elementary and moral education to any prisoner who wished to attend. Prior to this one of the prisoners had been providing educational lessons to other inmates. By the early 1900s, basic literacy programs were commonplace throughout Australian prisons, and by the 1950s, all major prisons in the country were offering some form of education and training programs, though no more than 15 to 20% of inmates at any given prison could participate in educational programs at one time.The Senate Employment, Education and Training References Committee produced the Senate Report of the Inquiry into Education and Training in Correctional Facilities in 1996. The report stated that the history of prison education in Australia "could fairly be described as a disgrace", with non-existent or poor facilities containing deficient and out-dated curricula and resources. It made several recommendations on how to improve prison education, including the development of a national strategy. In 2001, a national strategy was launched, and by 2006, all states and territories were offering some form of tertiary education to inmates. Each state and territory, however, maintains control over its own prison education systems; there is no national system leading to differences in the way education is offered. For example, inmates in the Australian Capital Territory have been allowed to have laptop computers in their cells for educational purposes since 2006, though as of 2017 this service is not available for inmates in New South Wales. Accordingly, certain educational and rehabilitation programs that require a computer cannot be offered there.
According to the New Zealand Annual Review of Education, the availability and quality of prison education in the country decreased significantly between 1959 and 2005, as government policy shifted from prisons focusing on rehabilitation to prisons focusing on punishment. A 2005 Ombudsman's report stated there were "low levels of rehabilitative and productive activities" for prisoners in New Zealand.
Asia
Prison education in Japan can be traced back to at least 1871, when practical ethics lectures were introduced into a prison in Tokyo. Reading and writing classes began being implemented into the prison system on a larger scale by 1881. By the late 1880s, it was believed that ethics classes were the most important form of education for prisoners, and by the 1890s, education was considered one of the most important issues of the prison system. Conferences, mostly attended by prison staff, were held in 1889 and 1892 to discuss ways to improve education within the prison system. There was no unanimous agreement on the best way to implement moral education for prisoners, and different institutions began running their own individual programs. As of 1910, prison law in Japan ordered education be given to all juvenile inmates, and to any adult inmate deemed to have a need. Regulations stipulated two to four hours per day be set aside for education.Changes were made to prison system in China in the 1920s, following the establishment of the Republic of China. Resulting from criticism of the lack of education for inmates at the time, there was a shift in the prison system away from religious and moral teaching, to intellectual education and hard labour as the primary means of rehabilitation. Authorities took considerable effort to develop an effective and diverse educational curriculum. As well as teaching literacy and arithmetic, classes also included music and composition, popular ethics, confucianism and patriotic and political doctrine; the teaching of party doctrine increased significantly in the 1930s. In 1981, the People's Republic of China incorporated prison education into its national education program, significantly increasing access for inmates.
Africa
In 1961, South Africa began holding criminal and political prisoners in a jail on Robben Island. Inmates were encouraged to study when the prison opened, and education programs to ensure all inmates were literate were initiated. Only inmates whose families could afford to pay for tuition fees were permitted to participate, and access to education improved and then regressed with the prison's ever changing policy; by the end on the 1960s, programs were restricted on the concern they were improving the inmate's morale too much. Historians also speculate the prison system was concerned that inmates were becoming better educated than the guards. Inmates were able to undertake correspondence courses through the University of London International Programmes; Nelson Mandela completed a Bachelor of Laws while in custody, though his educational privileges were revoked for four years after staff discovered he was writing an autobiography, something which was forbidden at the time. Efforts by inmates to educate themselves politically were significantly hampered by the prison's policy to forbid inmates access to newspapers, radios and television. These restrictions were lifted in the late 1970s; Jeff Radebe headed a political education program at the prison in the 1980s. As of 1993, education was a privilege rather than one of the inmates rights. Basic literacy courses were provided by paid inmates, rather than qualified teachers, and higher levels of education were only available to inmates who could afford correspondence courses.Prison education is generally less well-established throughout Africa in comparison to the Western world. The first prison in Nigeria was established in 1872, however, as of 2010, no formal education program had ever been implemented by the Nigerian government; in 1986, one prison launched organised educational programs though they were run and funded by inmates. Following the death of de facto President Sani Abacha in 1998, many political prisoners were released, bringing considerable media attention to the "grim conditions" they faced; prison in Nigeria was seen as purely punitive, with little to no resources given for infrastructure and rehabilitation programs, like education. The provision of education was varied from prison to prison, though typically offered nothing better than informal apprenticeships in trades necessary to keep prisons operational. However, by 2016, the National Open University of Nigeria had established training centers at six Nigerian prisons, and offers inmates a 50% discount on all tuition fees.
With funding from the United Nations Development Programme, a basic literacy program for inmates was launched in Ghana in 2003, and by 2008, all prisons there were offering education to inmates, though the program's effectiveness is severely affected by a lack of resources. For many years, the only prison education offered in Morocco was farming skills at the countries agricultural prisons, though a 2014 report found that educational opportunities had been increasing and that literacy, vocational and other educational programs were being offered.
Literacy rates and available programs
People in prison systems worldwide are consistently less educated than the general population. In a survey conducted in 2003, 53% of prisoners in Ireland were found to be ranked in the lowest category for literacy on the National Framework of Qualifications, compared to 23% of the general population. A survey of German inmates in 2003–04 found that 85.8% had completed middle-school, compared with 97% of the general population. 51.7% had completed secondary school, compared to 55.4% of the general population. In the US, as of 2004, 65% of inmates had either a General Educational Development or high school diploma, compared to 82% of the general population. Only 17% had tertiary education, compared to 51% of the general population. As of 2006, only 14% of prisoners had completed Year Twelve, compared to 63% of the general population in Australia. In the UK, as of 2010, 47% of inmates reported having no formal qualification compared to only 15% of the general population. In New Zealand, 66% of inmates reported having no secondary or tertiary qualifications, compared to 23% of the general population in 2016.Prison education courses can range from basic literacy courses and secondary school equivalency programs to vocational education and tertiary education programs. Non-formal activities that teach inmates new skills, like arts and crafts or amateur theatre productions, may also be considered a form of education. Likewise, some countries consider rehabilitation programs or physical education to be educational programs, whereas others do not. Educational programs within prisons are typically funded by the prisons themselves, and may be run by the individual prisons or contracted out to external providers. Primary, secondary and vocational education is typically free, though some countries require inmates or their families to pay for correspondence courses. Out of 28 surveyed European countries in 2012, 15 reported offering free distance education to inmates, and 13 reported that inmates would have to pay all associated costs. In some cases, only certain courses were free; in Denmark, correspondence courses at primary and lower-secondary level are free, though a percentage of courses undertaken at a higher level must be paid for by the inmate. Inmates in the UK are able to access the government student loans for university that are available to the general public, as are those in Australia. Charity groups, like the Prisoners' Education Trust in the UK, can accept applications for grants from prisoners who cannot afford to finance their distance education. Many prisons have mandated that educational programs should focus on basic literary skills, and accordingly, some do not offer any higher levels of education. It has been argued that such an approach creates a void for developing further skills, and incorrectly suggests that people with only the most basic skills will no longer commit crimes.
In both Australia and the UK, prisoners on remand or in hospital are not eligible to undertake educational study, nor are prisoners on remand in Poland. Norway and Finland, however, do not house those on remand separately, and they are entitled to the same educational opportunities as regular prisoners. In Denmark and Sweden inmates on remand are entitled to some education programs, though less than those available to other prisoners.
Challenges
There are several barriers to both running and participating in educational programs in prisons. Prison teachers may be faced with the challenge of instructing a class that has a large variance in age, educational levels, or employment history. Prisons consider security concerns more important than educational goals, which restricts how some vocational trades are delivered because of concerns about prisoners manufacturing weapons. There can be issues when inmates need to be transferred between different areas of the prison for educational purposes. For example, different groups of inmates are sometimes kept separated from each other for security reasons, which means if one group is using a walkway others may not be able to be moved through it. If prisons are on lockdown, inmates will be unable to attend classes; lockdowns can last for several weeks.There is a common perception that inmates have a large amount free time; however, they may only be allocated extremely limited time specifically for access to educational resources. Distance education courses are increasingly only being offered online, which presents a significant barrier as most countries do not permit inmates to access the internet. Shortages of available space in existing educational programs can lead to significant waiting lists for enrollment. In some cases inmates may not be able to access education because the wait times are longer than their sentences. Educating foreign inmates in prisons can also be challenging, due to language barriers.
One of the biggest barriers to prison education is the frequent transfer of prisoners between correctional facilities. Inmates may be moved to another facility at any time for a variety of reasons, such as overcrowding, a downgrade in security classification, court appearances or medical appointments. Different prisons may have vastly different attitudes toward or available access to education. If an education course is run by the prison in-house, moving an enrollee to another prison will effectively force them to drop out. Inmates studying correspondence courses will have to notify their course provider, usually by mail, of their change in circumstance and new postal address, and will be reliant on the goodwill of both the course provider and the new prison's education officer to help them catch up on any missed work. If study materials are lost or misplaced in-transit, inmates will have to reapply to education providers for replacements. Being moved between facilities is a major cause of inmates ceasing study at university level.
Other hindrances to prison education are staff shortages, a lack of educational resources in prison libraries, not having a dedicated room to hold classes in, a lack of audio-visual equipment and computers, not having a suitable place to study and not having a suitable place for group work activities after classroom hours. In-house educators may not have adequate training from the prison for their role, and a prison may have difficulty finding external teachers willing to work for the rates of pay that prisons can offer. Government departments charging one another for services may also present a barrier. For example, a state-owned prison's budget may not allow it to afford the fees set by a state-owned education provider. Prison education programs may also face a lack of support or outright opposition from prison personnel where they operate. For example, some prison staff may resent the inmates' educational opportunities, because they are poorly educated themselves, or because they had to pay for their education while inmates are receiving theirs for free.
Prisoners themselves may be reluctant to participate in programs because of previous failures in education or lack of motivation. Foreign inmates who will be deported at the end of their sentence often lack incentive to learn the language of the country they are incarcerated in, or obtain qualifications there. The types of vocational training offered by prisons in the Western world, such as manufacturing, will often not be useful to someone who will be deported to a country where the manufacturing industry is not well developed. Financial incentives also play a factor in an inmate's decision to participate in educational programs. In both the UK and Belgium, the allowance given to inmates who undertake study is lower than that given to inmates who undertake domestic work such as cleaning or food-preparation, which results in inmates having a preference for domestic work. Inmates with children have a particular preference for employment over education in prison, as it enables them to send more money to their families.
Reductions in recidivism
Rates
The recidivism rate among prisoners in many countries is high. As of 2011, within three years of release, seven out of ten inmates in the US will have re-offended and half will be back in prison. In Australia, 44.8% of prisoners released between 2014 and 2015 returned to prison within two years. In England and Wales, 46% of those released from prison between April 2013 and March 2014 were re-incarcerated within 12 months. Recidivism is also high in the Caribbean, with The Bahamas and Belize both having rates above 60% as of the late 1990s, and in Latin America, with Brazil, Argentina, Mexico and Chile all having rates above 40% as of 2014. As of 2012, official recidivism rates in South Africa are not known though are accepted as high, and have been quoted as high as 95%.Reasons
Ex-prisoners often face difficulty obtaining employment after their release, and this is strongly associated with re-offending. Prison education programs are intended to reduce recidivism by increasing an inmates' ability to secure employment. A study in the UK in 2002 found that employment reduced a former prisoners chance of re-offending by at least a third, and a meta-analysis conducted by the RAND Corporation, which completed a comprehensive literature search of studies released in the US between 1980 and 2011, found that participating in educational courses increased an inmate's chances of being employed post-release by 13%.Prison education also has therapeutic benefits such as alleviating boredom, improving self-esteem and stimulating creativity, all of which have been linked to reductions in recidivism. Educational programs have also been shown to reduce violence within prisons; UNESCO has suggested general educational programs for prisoners as a way of combating extremism.
Effects
Study designs
of the effects of education on recidivism have been criticised for self-selection bias: it has been argued that recidivism is not due to the educational courses themselves, but only reflects the positive attitudes of people who volunteer for them. "Quasi-experimental" attempts to control for such biasses with paired difference tests have found that the effect on recidivism persists. Trials that randomly assigned prisoners to either a treatment group or a control group, thus making self-selection impossible, found similar effects. Such fully-experimental interventions are rare in criminology; practical difficulties are often cited as a reason for this lack, but the culture of the academic field may be more relevant. A study in North Carolina using data from 1990-1991 found that there was no significant differences in outcomes for prisoners who volunteered for programs, compared to those who were required to participate in education due to official mandates, supporting a call for mandatory literacy programs in prison.History and results
In the US, there were few studies on the relationship between educational programs and recidivism before the 1970s. The first was done at Ohio Penitentiary in 1924, and examined 200 inmates who had completed correspondence programs. The results, which found that inmates in the program were more "successful" after release, established the first link in the US between prison education and reduced recidivism. A 1948 study at a Wisconsin State Prison examined 680 prisoners who attended full-time study in custody for two years after their release. Results indicated a "small but statistically significant" decrease in recidivism. The first extensive study undertaken to examine the relationship was called Project Newgate. Beginning in 1969, and studying 145 inmates in Minnesota over five years, results indicated that inmates who participated in an education program were more than 33% less likely to return to prison. Other results at the time were not unanimous. A meta-analysis in 1975 and another in 1983 found that while education programs in prison were beneficial for inmates, their effects on recidivism were inconclusive. More recent studies, however, consistently show that educational programs reduce the rates of re-offending. A 1987 study of Federal Bureau of Prisons inmates found that those who participated in education programs were 8.6% less likely to return to prison, and a 1997 study of 3,200 inmates in Maryland, Minnesota and Ohio found a reduction rate of 29%. A meta-analysis of 15 studies done in the US during the 1990s found that, on average, inmates who attended tertiary level education in prison were 31% less likely to re-offend, and the RAND Corporation meta-analysis found that, on average, there was a reduction rate of 13% for inmates who participated in educational programs. A prison educational program created by Bard College has a recidivism rate of 4% for people who only attended the course and 2.5% for those who completed it.An Australian study of prisoners released between July 2001 and November 2002 found that in the two years following release, inmates who participated in educational programs were nine percent less likely to return to prison, a 2005 report found that in the Australian state of Queensland there was a 24–28% reduction in the rate of recidivism among inmates who completed education courses, and a study of 14,643 prisoners in Western Australia between 2005 and 2010 found that those who undertook prison education were 11.25% less likely to be re-incarcerated. In England and Wales, a 2014 study of more than 6,000 prisoners found that those who undertook education courses were seven percent less likely to return to prison. A prison education program in Ukraine had only three out of 168 participants re-offend in 2013; the re-offending rate in Ukraine in 1993 was 30% within three years and 66% within five years. As of 2012, the re-offending rate in the Dominican Republic for persons incarcerated in prisons with mandatory educational programs is less than 3% after three years, compared to about 50% for those in prisons without such programs.
Effects of prison education courses have been found to be cumulative; studies show the more classes an individual takes while in prison, the less likely they will be to re-offend. Studies also show higher level qualifications are associated with lower re-offending rates. A 2000 study by the Texas Department of Education found that the overall re-offending rate was 40–43%, though inmates who completed an associate degree while in custody had only a 27.2% chance of re-offending, and those who a completed a bachelor's degree had a rate of only 7.8%.
Cost and financial benefits
The cost of providing education to a prisoner was between $2,000 and $3,782 per year, and the cost of incarceration itself was $32,000 to $40,000 per year in the US in 2009, according to the National Association of State Budget Officers. According to the RAND Corporation, in 2013 the figures were between $1,400 and $1,744 for the cost of education, and between $28,323 and $31,286 for the annual cost of incarceration per inmate.In England and Wales, education courses linked with reduced recidivism are priced at about £250 each as of 2014, compared to a £37,648 cost of annual incarceration per inmate. In Canada, the cost of inmate education in 2013 was $2,950 per year, compared to an annual cost of $111,202 for incarceration per male inmate; female inmates cost approximately twice this amount to incarcerate. In Australia in 1988, the cost of incarcerating a prisoner was $40,000 a year, while the entire budget for prison education at Bathurst Correctional Complex was $120,000 per year. In order for that prison's program to be cost effective at that time, it would have only needed to keep one person out of prison for three years. As of 2015, the cost of incarcerating a prisoner in Australia is $109,821 a year.
Studies have found that due to the increased post-release employment and decreased recidivism associated with prison education, the financial savings to the community more than offset the cost of the programs. A 2003 study found that a prison education program in Maryland reduced recidivism by 20%. Government analysts estimated that the education program was saving taxpayers more than $24 million a year based solely on the costs of re-incarceration. This estimation did not factor in the additional savings due to reduced strain on police, judicial and social service systems, nor the financial benefit from the fact that prisoners who gain employment after release pay taxes and are better able to support their families. Taxpayers save additional money as prisoners who find employment post-release are less reliant on public financial assistance.
A 2004 study by the University of California found that spending $1 million on prison education prevents about 600 crimes, and the same amount spent on incarceration prevents only 350 crimes. A 2009 study found that in the UK, every £1 spent on prison education saved taxpayers £2.50. The 2013 RAND Corporation study estimated that every dollar spent on education saves taxpayers $4 to $5, and that to break even on the cost of education programs, recidivism must be reduced by between 1.9% and 2.6%. According to Forbes in 2013, given the relatively low cost of education and long-term financial savings "it's hard to fathom why there isn't a national, fully funded prison education program in every facility".
Education has also been advocated for prisoners who are not expected to ever be released, on the grounds that it promotes a better atmosphere in the prison community, and prisoners serving life sentences often act as role models for others.
Funding allocation and prevalence
Both the availability and rate of participation in prison education programs, as well as the funding available for programs, varies greatly around the world. It is often difficult to obtain meaningful data on the amount of funding available for prison education, as the money may not come from a dedicated budget, but rather from a variety of sources. In some cases, each individual prison receives a set amount of funding, and the prison warden must determine how much, if any, is spent on education. A survey in 2012 financed by the European Commission found that out of 31 countries in Europe, the majority reported no change in the budget for prison education over the previous three years. Funding was reported to have decreased for general education in three countries and increased in four. Countries that decreased funding appeared to also have decreases in prison budgets overall, while those that reported increases may have only been a reflection of the growth in prison population and corresponding increase in overall spending. The budget for prison education in Norway increased from NOK 107 million in 2005 to NOK 225 million in 2012. In the US, the rate of spending on prison education has decreased, even though the budget for the prison system overall has increased. In 2010, 29% of prison budgets were allocated to education, the lowest rate in three decades; in 1982, the rate was 33%. Funding for tertiary programs was reduced from $23 million in 2008 to $17 million in 2009. In Honduras, as of 2012, 97% of the prison system's budget is spent entirely on staff salaries and food, leaving barely any funding for sanitation or other services.A study in 1994 of 34 countries found that half offered basic literacy programs to inmates, and one-third a form of education higher than that. As of 2005, 35–42% of prisons in the US were offering tertiary education programs, and as of 2009–10, six percent of inmates in participating states were enrolled in such a program. While Kyrgyzstan's Criminal Code guarantees the right to education for inmates, the country's prison system has been plagued with problems since the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, including insufficient budgets and training for educational staff. As of 2014, six of the 31 prisons in the country offered vocational education, and 13.5% of inmates overall were enrolled in such programs. The Bahamas initiated a prison education program in 1994, which, while successful, only had the resources to be delivered to 10.75% of inmates. As of 1996, only 6% of prisoners in Venezuela had access to education, and many prisons there did not offer education at all.
In 2012–13, 14,353 of the Morocco's 70,675 inmates participated in educational programs, an increase of about 20% on the previous year. Educating prisoners in Morocco is particularly challenging, as about 79% of inmates are illiterate and 46% are on remand. As of 2014, it is compulsory for inmates in South Africa to complete at least Grade 9 of schooling. As of 2017, 50% of inmates at Naivasha prison in Kenya are undertaking formal education, and inmates across the country can complete distance education through the University of London. As of 2016, imprisoned students in Egypt are allowed to complete university degrees, but only those that do not require practical components such as the laboratory work that science degrees would require. Prisoners are also entitled to complete their Thanaweya Amma tests. As of 1992, 440 inmates in Egypt were attending secondary or university education. Inspectors from Human Rights Watch were shown classrooms purported to be used for teaching basic literacy at two prisons, though they reported the rooms appeared to not have not been used for some time, and also heard an allegation that inmates were only permitted to access education if they first converted to Islam. Prisoners in Jordan have access to secondary and tertiary education, though female prisoners are typically given access to less educational programs than men. Roumieh Prison, which houses about half the prisoners in Lebanon, has 12% of inmates enrolled in secondary education and 7% in tertiary education as of 2014. Prisoners formally had access to a wide range of industrial vocational education, however, these programs were terminated in 1975 due to concerns about manufacturing weapons; as of 2017 the only vocational education offered is computer literacy.
Both the European Convention on Human Rights and the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union state that no person shall be denied the right to education, and the European Prison Rules state the education of prisoners shall "be integrated with the educational and vocational training system of the country so that after their release they may continue their education and vocational training without difficulty". Despite this, prison policy documentation in several European countries does not mention education at all, and the 2012 European Commission survey found that there were 15 countries in Europe with less than 25% of inmates participating in educational programs. Twenty-one of the countries reported there had been an increase in participation over the last five years, five reported no change and three reported a small decrease. Participation for juveniles was considerably higher; these results were expected as juvenile inmates are generally under the mandatory age for school attendance. Eleven of the countries reported a rate of above 50%, and a further 10 countries reported a rate of over 75%. The survey also found that general education was offered to adult inmates in all prisons in 15 countries, in the majority of prisons in six countries and in less than half of prisons in 10 countries.
In the UK, between 2010 and 2015, the number of inmates studying at university level dropped from 1,722 to 1,079, and the number of inmates studying at GCE Advanced Level had halved. As of 2016, only 16% of those who leave prison in the UK completed an education or training placement. According to a 2014 report, Belarus had 82 correctional centres, five of which were running primary and secondary schooling for inmates and a further 21 which were offering vocational training.
While inmates may face difficulty accessing education in some European countries, it is widely available or even mandatory in others. In both Germany and the Netherlands, prisoners are required to both work and study work while in custody. In 2013, between half and three-quarters of inmates in Germany participated in education programs. Prison education is considered to be exceptionally good in Norway; by law all inmates must have access to educational courses. Similar laws are in effect in Austria, and Denmark. As of 2017, the European Union is funding a prison school in Jamaica.
In 1996–97, the rate of prisoners undertaking education in Australia ranged from 28% in South Australia to 88% in New South Wales, and averaged 57%. For 2006–07, the national average was 36.1%. A 2014 report found that decreases in participation was due to the inability of prison educational courses across the country to cope with the growth in the prison population. In 2017–18, the national average was 34.0%. Vocational education had the highest participation rate at 23.6%, and university level education had the lowest at 1.8%. In every state and territory in Australia, the demand for prison education greatly exceeds the available space.
A 1990 investigation by Human Rights Watch which visited seven prisons in Indonesia found that all the prisons offered some form of basic literacy classes, though very little education beyond this level. In two of the prisons, "religious education" was compulsory. In 1991, 561,000 inmates in China attended education courses and 546,000 were awarded a certificate for completing such a course; there were 1.2 million inmates in China in 1991. As of 2016, only one of Singapore's 14 prisons has a school for inmates. Participation at the prison, however, is increasing. In 2015, 239 inmates sat for General Certificate of Education exams, compared to 210 in 2012. As of 2018, only one prison in Japan operates a middle school. Male prisoners nationwide who do not have a middle school education can be transferred on request to the school, which has been operating since 1955. There were six graduates in 2002, and three in 2018.
Opposition
Prison education programs are not without opposition. There is often little public sympathy for prisoners, and the issue is often not given political priority, as there may be few votes to be gained from political support. The lack of support for prison education has been linked to sensationalist reporting on crime, including a disproportionate emphasis on violent offences, perpetuating public fear. This in turn leads to a political desire to be seen as "tough on crime". According to the United Nations General Assembly, the "willingness of politicians" to reflect these fears has led to a "reluctance to embed prisoners’ rights to education".Arguments made against prison education include that inmates do not deserve the right to be educated, doing so is being "soft on crime", and that it is a waste of taxpayers' money. It has also been argued that giving imprisoned people education is "rewarding" them for having committed crimes, and that it is unfair for inmates to receive free education when law-abiding citizens must pay for it. According to criminologist Grant Duwe, the complaint that giving prisoners free education effectively treats them better than regular citizens is valid, though the practice should nonetheless be encouraged due to the significant savings for taxpayers as a result of decreases in crime.
Politicians who have advocated for prison education are often met with opposition from rival parties. In 2014, New York Governor Andrew Cuomo proposed allocating $1 million of the state's $2.8 billion budget for prisons towards a college program for inmates. The proposal was supported by 53% of voters; however, it faced backlash from lawmakers and the opposition party, with 68% of Republicans opposing it. It was subsequently withdrawn and replaced by a program that was privately funded instead. In response, three Republican congressmen introduced a bill entitled the Kids Before Cons Act, which aimed to remove Pell grants and federal financial aid for prison education, but the bill was never brought to a vote. Efforts to expand prison education in the Australian state of Queensland by the Labor Party have frequently been opposed by the Liberal Party; in 2016, then Shadow Minister for Police Jarrod Bleijie said that prison "shouldn't be a place where we want to invest all this money into making sure a better education than what our kids are".