Prison Education and Reentry Commons^™

Trust, Power, And Transformation In The Prison Classroom, Fran Fairbairn

Journal of Prison Education and Reentry (2014-2023)

This article does three things. First, it asks a new question about transformative education, namely ‘what is the role of power and trust in the decision of whether to transform one’s meaning scheme in the face of new information or whether to simply reject the new information?’ Secondly, it develops a five-stage model which elaborates on the role of this decision in transformative learning.[1] Finally, it uses grounded-theory and the five-stage model to argue that power and trust play an important role in facilitating transformative learning.

[1] This account should be thought of as complementary to (not exclusionary of) Mezirow’s …

The Open University And Prison Education In The Uk – The First 50 Years, Rod Earle, James Mehigan, Anne Pike, Dan Weinbren

Journal of Prison Education and Reentry (2014-2023)

In 2019, The Open University (henceforth, The OU), based in Milton Keynes in the UK, celebrated its 50th anniversary. Since 1971 it has pioneered the delivery of Higher Education in prisons and other secure settings. Some 50 years on, in 2021 there is much to celebrate and still more to learn. In this article we briefly review the establishment of the OU in 1969 and explore how it has maintained access to higher education in the prison system. It draws from a collection of essays and reflections on prison learning experiences developed by OU academics and former and continuing OU …

The Lopez Effect Remixed: The Significance Of Mattering Through A Hip-Hop Lens In Education And Beyond, Kashema Hutchinson

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

The goal of this dissertation is to examine the theoretical frameworks of mattering (Rosenberg & McCullough, 1981; Schlossberg, 1989; Love, 2018) in traditional and non-traditional spaces through a Hip-hop lens. When mattering is applied to marginalized groups, it centers them to a certain extent. In my dissertation, I examine how Dr. Nadia Lopez, the former principal of junior high school, Mott Hall Bridges Academy (MHBA), employed mattering in her holistic approach to education. Her dedication to her students, faculty and staff went viral on the popular blog Humans of New York in January 2015. Lopez’s commitment is to “open a …

Understanding Aspiration And Education Towards Desistance From Offending: The Role Of Higher Education In Wales, Mark Jones, Debbie Jones

Journal of Prison Education and Reentry (2014-2023)

There has been a growing recognition of the value of education in facilitating desistance from offending. Yet, despite a determined push to “widen access” universities continue to be an unwelcoming place for those with a criminal record. To better understand the role of higher education in raising aspiration towards desistance, this paper draws on findings from a study in Swansea, Wales. Adopting a Pictorial Narrative approach the findings suggest that, whilst the participants identified potential benefits of attaining a higher education, those aspirations were outweighed by a distrust of the “institution” and a fear that the stigmatisation experienced through the …

Career Preperation Capstone, Jennifer M. Combs

Morehead State Theses and Dissertations

A capstone submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Education in the Ernst and Sara Lane Volgenau College of Education at Morehead State University on April 14, 2021.

Barriers To Post-Secondary Success, Douglas Swanson, Najeana Henderson, Maritza Sloan

Dissertations

This study reviews factors that prior studies have identified or failed to consider as barriers to post-secondary success. The three main areas include academic success for Latinx students after high school, organizational systems and their impact on African-American students’ postsecondary readiness, and what workers think of their high school education with regards to career preparedness.

Five factors are identified as major barriers for Latinx students to continue in a higher education system. A survey of former students from Saint Louis, Missouri, and Dallas, Texas, metroplex area identified 56 Latinx students that participated in an initial survey. This led to a …

The History Of Denying Federal Financial Aid To System-Impacted Students, Bradley D. Custer

Journal of Student Financial Aid

People who are impacted by the criminal justice system (“system-impacted”) face barriers when seeking financial aid to pay for college. Between the late 1960s and the early 2000s, Congress created laws that prohibited incarcerated students and students with certain criminal convictions from receiving federal grants and loans. This paper offers a comprehensive review of the history of those laws, which provides context for current debates on restoring Pell Grants to students in prison. Legislative documents, scholarly sources, and news reports were studied to build this historical review. Key lessons from history are discussed as to how Congress might treat system-impacted …