Approximately five years ago, New York State legislators and the federal government ended college tuition assistance for incarcerated students. This tremendously successful college program for prisoners lasted 15 or more years, resulting in invaluable and immeasurable benefits, not only for those who were incarcerated, but for society as a whole.
Politicians claimed that this move was a reflection of the "public’s attitude that taxpayers shouldn’t provide prisoners with college degrees." As a prisoner and a student, respectfully, I do not subscribe to such a misguided, ill-conceived, shortsighted, and uninformed notion.
According to the New York State Department of Correctional Services, of the nearly 72,000 state prisoners, a full 64 percent do not posses a high school education; that’s over 46,000 prisoners! Studies consistently show that education is the most successful method of reducing recidivism, with higher education achieving the best rehabilitation levels. It is not surprising that over 48 percent of all prisoners without a college degree return to prison, as compared to a mere six percent of those with a college degree eventually becoming recidivist.
Contrary to popular belief, there are numerous prisoners desperately wishing to bring about a dramatic and positive change to their lives; they simply require more help. Those who have made a sincere commitment to attend college are in many ways just like their hardworking counterparts in society—having to attend college at night, after completing a full day of work in his (or her) required prison job assignment.
The cost to taxpayers for keeping each prisoner confined has been conservatively estimated to be $30-40 thousand per year, per prisoner. This amounts to billions of tax dollars per year, not to mention the devastating social, psychological, and emotional effects it has upon our society as a whole. These funds come out of the same budget which has been slated for our decrepit schools, neighborhoods, and infrastructure.
Just as our citizenry became dissatisfied with higher taxes to fund welfare recipients and social service costs, so too, will knowledgeable taxpayers come to terms with the fact that the ideal corrections system should work to put itself out of business some day, instead of lobbying legislators to put more heads in prison beds for longer periods. Education is a simple and feasible solution, with a track record to prove it.
The statistics are in and the data are compelling: higher education programs for prisoners that confer degrees, teach marketable skills, and instill self-esteem, confidence, and a sense of responsibility reduce recidivism better than building more prisons and hiring more police, more judges, and more prosecutors. Education for prisoners should not only reach into the deepest chasm of society’s compassion for humanity and the less fortunate, but moreover, because of its practicality, its proven effectiveness, and reliability of being a "sure-fire" way of assisting the so-called "dregs" of society to escape from their cycle of poverty, despair and crime that has plagued their very lives and brought them to prison in the first instance, this idea should be embraced, rather than shunned.
Surely, both the financial as well as physical resources can be put to much greater use. It is now time that the public rethink its position on education as it applies to those behind bars.
Markeith Boyd
Green Haven Correctional Facility
