Pell Grants for Public Safety

In the United States, the correctional system costs taxpayers more than $68 billion each year. One in every 31 people is under some form of correctional supervision: jail, prison, probation, or parole. More than two-thirds of formerly incarcerated people are re-arrested for a new offense within three years of their release, a clear indication that current correctional policies are failing.

Rising rates of imprisonment over the past 25 years have not shown to reduce crime of increase public safety. Many “get-tough-on-crime” policies, which have led to mass and over incarceration, simply do not work or are counterproductive. According to studies, education has proven to lower recidivism, and in turn lowers incarceration costs. For every dollar invested in correctional education programs, two dollars are saved through prevented recidivism.

Please join the Education from the Inside Out Coalition and the Open Society Foundations for a panel discussion on the importance of postsecondary correctional education as a meaningful step towards successful reintegration.

Speakers

• Dallas Pell, daughter of late Senator Claiborne Pell     
• Amy Solomon, Senior Advisor to the Assistant Attorney General,  Office of Justice Programs at the Department of Justice
• Marc Mauer, Executive Director, The Sentencing Project
• Jody Lewen, Executive Director, The Prison University Project
• Pat Nolan, Vice President, Prison Fellowship
• Nicole Sullivan, Manager, Office of Research and Planning, North Carolina Department of Correction
• Vivian Nixon, Executive Director, College and Community Fellowship (moderator)
• Glenn E. Martin, Vice President, the Fortune Society (moderator)