Pell Grants

History

Inmate education programs have existed in some form since the earliest penitentiaries. Prior to the 20th century, most courses in the prison system focused on work and religion. In the 1960s, educational programs started to provide inmates with adult basic education, secondary education, and eventually postsecondary education. In 1965, there were only 12 postsecondary educational programs available nationwide for inmates. By the early 1980s, due to Pell grants, 27,000 inmates were enrolled in 350 programs nationwide. This number continued to increase, so that by the early 1990s there were more than 38,000 inmate students enrolled in postsecondary educational programs in 92% of the nation's correctional systems.

Following the passage of the Violent Crime Control Act, however, the numbers of individuals behind bars who can afford to take college classes has fallen dramatically. For example, according to Bureau of Justice Statistics (1994), in 1991, 13.9% of the state prison population and 18.9% of the federal prison population were enrolled in college-level courses. The most recent data available by the Bureau of Justice Statistics, in 1997 (Stephan, 1997, p. 20), reports these numbers decreased to 9.9% and 12.9% respectively. In the absence of financial aid for the majority of the inmates who were without the resources needed to support post-secondary offerings, states and cooperating colleges and university systems discontinued their programs.

The Case for and against Pell Grants

To their supporters, Pell grants enabled prisoners to develop intellectually and socially by enrolling in university and college courses. They also involved tertiary institutions in the everyday life of penal institutions, thereby bridging the gap between the incarcerated and free populations. Perhaps most important, research revealed that inmates enrolled in postsecondary educational programs have continually shown to have lower recidivism rates than those not involved in these programs. Indeed, education and recidivism have an inverse relationship; as the level of education increases, the likelihood of rearrest, conviction, and reincarceration decreases.

To their critics, however, prisoners have no right to financial aid from the state. Legislators, some asserting inaccurately that law-abiding citizens were being displaced by criminals receiving federal aid for their education, evoked the long-held “principle of least eligibility” that no prisoner should have benefits not available to the working poor. Thus, Senator Jess Helms in 1991 argued that taxpayers were paying for inmates to get college tuition while law-abiding citizens were still struggling to pay for the same privilege. Though this argument appears to be somewhat overstated, given the small proportion of Pell grants that ever were earmarked for inmates, Helms's position provided a basis for the dismantling of the educational programs.

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