Andrew W. Mellon Foundation Increases Investment in Funding Prison Education and Re-entry Programs
NEW YORK, June 13, 2019 – The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation today announced a series of grants totaling $3.3 million to support four prison education and re-entry programs across the country. The grants acknowledge the human costs and large-scale social and historical impact of criminal justice policies on individuals and society and seek to strengthen and expand degree-granting programs in the liberal arts for currently and formerly incarcerated students.
“Mass incarceration is linked to mass undereducation, but innovative, proven interventions can address both crises,” said Mellon Foundation President Elizabeth Alexander. “The Mellon Foundation believes in each and every student’s humanity and sees expanding access to higher education in prison as a public good.”
“We know that higher-education-in-prison programs reduce violence inside prisons, improve incarcerated students’ ties with family and community in advance of parole, reduce rates of recidivism, and interrupt the cycle of intergenerational poverty,”said Mellon Foundation Senior Program Officer Eugene M. Tobin. “Prison classrooms can and should also be sites of curricular innovation in the humanities and a pipeline for transfer and reintegration services in partnership with universities and philanthropic supporters. College-in-prison programs represent values that should be at the heart of a democratic society.”
Grants will be awarded to support the following projects...