What happens when the educational opportunities for incarcerated learners are fundamentally changed by the passage of education reform legislation? In which were designed to streamline developmental education by creating clear pathways to course placement, eliminating prolonged remedial course sequences, and providing targeted supports in math and English at community colleges. All incarcerated students in California Community Colleges, the nation’s largest and most diverse community college system, were subject to these reforms. Prior research has demonstrated that gains have been made in enrollment and transfer since the passage of the AB 705 among non-incarcerated learners, but little is known about how these reforms have impacted the experiences and outcomes of incarcerated learners.
To address this critical gap, Research for Action (RFA) with funding from Ascendium is examining how reforms are being implemented in prison education in California and how formerly incarcerated learners, faculty, and administrators have experienced reforms as they are those most impacted by these changes.
In the first phase of our research study, we created a novel dataset linking course offering data from 22 of 24 colleges currently providing education in state prisons with enrollment and completion data from California Chancellor’s Office Management Information System (COMIS). Courses offered to incarcerated students were compared to those available to the general population of students. Among the findings were that the number of prison course offerings varied drastically across schools, and while concurrent support for students was common for general population courses, only five colleges offered these supports in prison. When examining student outcomes, course enrollment and completion patterns varied with some prison course sections having higher completions rates than their non-prison counterparts.
The next phase of our research involves site visits to seven institutions providing education to currently incarcerated students across the state of California, during which we will interview faculty and administrators working closely to support this population, as well as conducting focus groups with formerly incarcerated students to understand their experiences with these reforms.
In this research brief, we present context for understanding the intersections between developmental education and higher education in prison in California, additional preliminary findings from our research study, and implications for research and practice. Through this research we aim to examine the transformative possibilities of education in prison, and to provide the first comprehensive evidence of whether and how equity-focused reforms reach some of our most marginalized students.
